SpaceX Signs First Customer for Used Falcon Rocket
Elon Musk’s SpaceX has signed its first customer to use a previously flown rocket, with launch planned for later this year, the companies said on Tuesday. The launch for Luxembourg-based satellite operator SES SA sesfg.lu will mark the first commercial reuse of a Falcon 9 rocket, which is crucial to efforts by technology entrepreneur Musk’s Space Exploration Technologies Corp to reduce the cost of space launches. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell previously said the company was targeting a 30 percent discount for launches aboard previously flown rockets, which would bring the price down to about $43 million per flight, a fraction of what competitors charge. SpaceX has so far landed six Falcon 9 rockets and will attempt to land its seventh after Saturday’s scheduled launch in Florida of an Israeli communications satellite.