ISPCS Panel Discussion: The Marketplace

Panel Discussion: The Marketplace

Chair:

Raymond Vogel,  Business Development Principal Jacobs Technology, Inc.

Speakers:

• Monique Jacobson, Secretary of Tourism, State of New Mexico
• Andrew Nelson, Chief Operating Officer, XCOR Aerospace
• Sean Mahoney, Chief Executive Officer, Masten Space Systems
• Bob Allen, Executive Director, Innovation, Design, Entertainment, Art, and Storytelling (IDEAS)

Tweeters:

• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust
• Suzi Gordon ‏@suzigordon
• Justin Kugler @phalanx
• Chris Boshuizen ‏@cboshuizen
• ISPCS ‏@ISPCS

TWEETS

Andrew Nelson, XCOR

• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — XCOR’s Andrew Nelson: our challenge is that we’re in an industry competing with one of the best marketeers around, Richard Branson.
• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Nelson: 118 finalists from 67 countries in Axe competition coming to Orlando 1st week of Dec to compete for 23 flight spots.
• Suzi Gordon ‏@suzigordon — Nelson: XCOR markets by offering cheap/free space experiments to students, reminiscent of Apple putting its products in schools.
• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Question: how do you find out what customers want in the space industry. Nelson: you ask them.
• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Nelson: I want all of you to be able to fly in space.

Sean Mahoney, Masten

• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Masten’s Sean Mahoney: we have today the “minimum viable rocket” that serves customers today while we work on bigger ideas.
• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Mahoney: Masten has run entirely off of customer revenues for last 12 months. Challenge, though, to find investors.
• Justin Kugler ‏@phalanx — Sean Mahoney: if you’re not selling now, you don’t have a business – you have a hobby.
• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Mahoney: there’s a belief that, as a startup, you have to be cheap. I disagree; danger of underpricing, losing money.
• Justin Kugler ‏@phalanx — Mahoney: Marketing & sales should be together in the org chart. Should not be an excuse to not talk to people.

Bob Allen, IDEAS

• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Bob Allen, IDEAS: space is taking its place in the public as a “mythic construct”: exploration, adventure, barnstorming
• Justin Kugler ‏@phalanx — Bob Allen: entrepreneurial space offers us a new cultural myth, a new adventure, & entry to the “barnstorming” phase.
• Suzi Gordon ‏@suzigordon — Space is the new frontier, an offer of adventure, & the ‘barnstorming’ phase of the next generation.That excites people. – Bob Allen
• ISPCS ‏@ISPCS — Bob Allen: There is a worldwide phenomenal sense that we are at the barnstorming stage of space exploration.
• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Allen commends New Mexico for choosing name “Spaceport America”: “It’s like ‘Highlander’: there can be only one.”
• Suzi Gordon ‏@suzigordon — Bob Allen: Spaceport America in NM is all-American: Old West, Native American, and Space Race age America.
• Chris Boshuizen ‏@cboshuizen — @BobAllenIDEAS “Toxic Thruster is a great name for a heavy metal band”, on the toxicity of legacy space propellants.
• Jeff Foust ‏@jeff_foust — Quote of the day: “Toxic thruster sounds like a great name for a heavy metal band.”
• Suzi Gordon ‏@suzigordon — Allen talking about how Disney is awesome at innovation…because it is.
• Suzi Gordon ‏@suzigordon — “You can’t make up stories that are weirder than physics.” – Bob Allen

Monique Jacobson, State of New Mexico

• Justin Kugler ‏@phalanx — Monique Jacobson: Keep it focused on what your customer needs, not what you think your company needs.
• Suzi Gordon ‏@suzigordon — Monique Jacobson: Make decisions based on what the customer wants, not what the company needs.
• ISPCS ‏@ISPCS — Monique Jacobson: New Mexico is so grounded in history and the past and it is a perfect place for space tourism.
• ISPCS ‏@ISPCS — Jacobson: the world needs dreamers and doers, but what the world really needs is those who dream and do.