Donald Trump and Elon Musk are known to have met at least once, reportedly to discuss Mars and public-private partnerships.
Even though Musk had stated “he is not the right guy,” according to CNBC and referring to the President, he was called to join the table of strategic business advisers. Investors are grimacing at the line of communication held between Musk and Trump, as it will allow a higher degree of coordination with the government, paving the way for the evolution of the company and its projects.
Politics aside, Musk and Trump will cooperate with each other
Apparently, most of Elon Musk’s projects are of Trump’s liking, seeing that his rocket-building factories and Tesla assembly lines have provided the country with thousands of dignified jobs, which coherently served as Trump’s main leverage point during his presidential campaign.
Reportedly, Musk has the hope that the next administration will put in motion most of its plans to make the U.S. a leader in world affairs, including business and technology. Colleagues of both Musk and Trump acknowledge that both are very similar in some fields, being world-class salesmen and leaders.
SpaceX is already enjoying financing from the U.S. government as it signed a contract to launch a U.S. Air Force GPS satellite into orbit, which is expected to occur in 2018. Having a direct line of action with the government and the military will ensure that SpaceX will become the primary transport company linking U.S. affairs and affordable space travel.
Signing such contract with SpaceX “achieves a balance between mission success, meeting operational needs, lowering launch costs, and reintroducing competition for National Security Space missions,” according to Lt. Gen. Samuel Greaves, Air Force Program Executive Officer for Space, as reported by CNN.
SpaceX is not the only company in the market, but its latest affairs have shown that it is capable of becoming a dominating force in what we know as space travel. Boeing-owned United Launch Alliance and Amazon-owned Blue Origin try to be at par with SpaceX, but by privately meeting with the President of the United States and scoring an $82.7 million contract, Elon Musk appears to have the lead in the race.
The company also enjoys other contracts provided by the government, such as the task of shipping supplies to the International Space Station and to launch U.S. astronauts into space, people that are perceived as invaluable assets for the scientific progress of the country and who are put at risk during every launch procedure.
According to Elon Musk, a mission headed to Mars will take no longer than two years to occur. The plan is to send specialized Dragon spacecraft to the Martian surface in order to collect soil samples, while also performing measurements to better understand the conditions that astronauts would have to endure while walking on Mars.
Source: CNN