Elon Musk's SpaceX has had a successful year in 2023, smashing its previous launch records and achieving the ability to send text messages via its Starlink satellites.
What Happened: Musk announced SpaceX's most notable achievements during an hour-long speech, giving an update to employees and investors alike.
Musk started off with SpaceX's biggest achievement in 2023: its 96 rocket launches, not including the two Starship test flights, which were not carrying any commercial payload.
SpaceX set a blistering pace by launching one rocket every four days in 2023. The company beat its own record of 61 launches that it set in 2022.
"The next best is Soviet [Union]'s Soyuz, which has 60 launches in a year, and we did 96," Musk said.
Musk also had a chuckle at the fact that SpaceX has not only launched satellites for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), European Space Agency (ESA), but also for rivals like satellite connectivity rival OneWeb.
SpaceX also launched satellites for Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, the parent of its rival Blue Origin. Musk and the attendees had a chuckle at that.
"There's a lot of ‘wow.'"
In 2024, Musk says SpaceX plans to launch 144 rockets as it looks to maintain its record of delivering a 50% increase in the pace of rocket launches.
The Key To Making Humanity A Spacefaring Civilization
Colonizing Mars has been one of Musk's obsessions, and he remains focused on it still. However, before that is achieved, there are a lot of things that humanity has to achieve in terms of its space technologies.
According to Musk, reusability is the key to making humanity a spacefaring civilization.
"There were a lot of people that said it couldn't be done, and then there were a lot of people even if it could be done, it would be a dumb idea, that it wouldn't pay off," Musk exclaimed.
"But we've shown that in fact it is absolutely the right idea. Reusability is the key to a great future in space. It is essential."
Musk recalled the first booster landing nearly eight years ago. SpaceX has so far achieved 262 landings, and while that might be an astonishing achievement for space fans, Musk himself seemed excited about it, too.
"The fundamental invention that is necessary for humanity to become a multi-planet species is a full and rapidly reusable, reliable rocket," he said.
"It's incredible what has happened in eight years. I wonder what will happen in eight years from now."
Musk said he thinks we might land on Mars and the Moon [again] by then and, hopefully, send people to Mars, too.
You can watch the full hour-long speech below.
Read Next: Elon Musk Sets Ambitious Starship Production Goals ‘To Achieve Mars Colonization’ In 3 Decades
Image: Created with artificial intelligence on MidJourney and Official SpaceX Photos on Flickr
© 2024 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
Comments
Trade confidently with insights and alerts from analyst ratings, free reports and breaking news that affects the stocks you care about.
