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The second space race is not about a confrontation between China and the US, but rather about the privatization of space.
The space economy is worth hundreds of billions of dollars per year, and it is still in its early stages. Last Thursday, the US company Intuitive Machines’ IM-1 mission launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. This is the second attempt by the Americans to send a commercial mission to our satellite.
Private companies have been making their way into space exploration, but so far only a handful have tried their luck on the Moon. Most have stayed closer to home, in the lower orbits, in a commercialization with its own name: the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) economy.
Before we proceed, we need to take a look at the space economy in general. In order to have a definition that helps us understand what it is all about. As it is an emerging sector, there are already institutions that have been quick to answer this question, such as the OECD. According to its definition, the space economy is “the total set of activities and the use of resources that create value and benefits for humankind in the development of exploration, research, understanding, management and use of space.”
One might think of this economy as a mere projection into the future, but the estimates tell us a story…
