Space manufacturing company Varda gets clearance to launch more unmanned rockets
(2025/06/19)
- Reference: 1750322354
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/06/19/varda_gets_faa_reentry_license/
- Source link:
America's aviation regulator has issued its first license for unmanned spacecraft to reenter the Earth's atmosphere to Varda, a startup that's trying to build a space-based manufacturing business.
Last April the FAA [1]introduced [2]Part Rule 450 to the Code of Federal Regulations, requiring unmanned vehicles to get a license for return trips. Spacecraft carrying humans have always had such rules.
The award clears Varda to pursue its goal of launching tiny factories into space where they can take advantage of low gravity to build things that can’t be manufactured on Earth.
[3]
The space building business, cofounded by former SpaceX engineer Will Bruey in 2020, has used Rocket Labs hardware to get into orbit. For future trips it will use a range of platforms, including SpaceX. Its next mission is only days away, a Varda spokesperson told The Register , and if all goes well will see its 300kg (660lb) Winnebago spacecraft spend months in space.
[4]
[5]
"This milestone was achieved because Varda provided comprehensive means of compliance for flight safety analysis across multiple operations, to which the FAA fully accepted," the agency said in its [6]ruling .
"Provided Varda operates under the authorized mission profile and vehicle design, it will no longer need to apply for mission-by-mission license approvals. The FAA will, however, continue to perform safety oversight of each operation."
[7]FAA now requires reentry vehicles to get licensed before launch
[8]Varda capsule proves you don't need astronauts for gravity-defying science
[9]Scientists strangely unable to follow recipe for holy grail room-temp superconductor
[10]NASA awards $150 million to prototype tech for humans on the Moon, and above it
Varda already had [11]three missions under its belt before getting the all-clear to carry on firing laboratory equipment into space. The first, which lifted off in June 2023, [12]crystallized a form of the anti-AIDS drug Ritonavir.
"We are focused on our core competencies in the life sciences as far as our internal research goes," Brandi Sippel, Varda's VP of Mission Management, told us. "However, we proudly serve government partners through our hypersonic testbed, and we’re happy to host payloads from researchers in other fields who want to recover their experiments quickly, iterate, and send something up again."
[13]
Varda’s second mission carried a payload from the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) designed to monitor the effects of high-speed reentry into Earth’s atmosphere. The space company’s craft clocks Mach 25 (19,000 mph) as it de-orbits. Space boffins will use data derived from those dives to design better thermal shielding for hypersonic travel.
The third mission also carried AFRL hardware, this time an Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) that measured the accuracy of navigation tools at reentry speeds. That's going to be vital in aiming hypersonic machinery operating at high-Mach numbers.
The fourth and fifth missions scheduled for 2025 will be the first on which Vanta builds its own capsule, rather than outsourcing it to Rocket Lab. The capsule uses a Conformal Phenolic Impregnated Carbon Ablator, a special form of heat shield developed by NASA that keeps instrumentation and the product of manufacturing in a stable condition during the intense heat of reentry.
[14]
"One day we intend to have daily reentries – while we’re launching and reentering quarterly now, we only expect that to increase," Sippel predicted.
NASA's [15]research shows that orbital manufacturing could have real benefits due to lower gravity and the way different materials operate in such environments - for example sediment formation is reduced and thermal stresses differ from here on Earth. ®
Get our [16]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/22/faa_now_requires_reentry_vehicles/
[2] https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-14/chapter-III/subchapter-C/part-450
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aFPfukfyKu-dPv7f3h6sbQAAAkY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
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[6] https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/statements/general-statements
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/22/faa_now_requires_reentry_vehicles/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/02/23/materials_processed_in_space_return/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/08/07/lk_99_superconductor_tests_inconclusive/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/26/nasa_moon_funding/
[11] https://www.varda.com/platform
[12] https://chemrxiv.org/engage/chemrxiv/article-details/65faecbee9ebbb4db91b4ac1
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aFPfukfyKu-dPv7f3h6sbQAAAkY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aFPfukfyKu-dPv7f3h6sbQAAAkY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[15] https://osf.io/preprints/osf/d6ar4_v1
[16] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Last April the FAA [1]introduced [2]Part Rule 450 to the Code of Federal Regulations, requiring unmanned vehicles to get a license for return trips. Spacecraft carrying humans have always had such rules.
The award clears Varda to pursue its goal of launching tiny factories into space where they can take advantage of low gravity to build things that can’t be manufactured on Earth.
[3]
The space building business, cofounded by former SpaceX engineer Will Bruey in 2020, has used Rocket Labs hardware to get into orbit. For future trips it will use a range of platforms, including SpaceX. Its next mission is only days away, a Varda spokesperson told The Register , and if all goes well will see its 300kg (660lb) Winnebago spacecraft spend months in space.
[4]
[5]
"This milestone was achieved because Varda provided comprehensive means of compliance for flight safety analysis across multiple operations, to which the FAA fully accepted," the agency said in its [6]ruling .
"Provided Varda operates under the authorized mission profile and vehicle design, it will no longer need to apply for mission-by-mission license approvals. The FAA will, however, continue to perform safety oversight of each operation."
[7]FAA now requires reentry vehicles to get licensed before launch
[8]Varda capsule proves you don't need astronauts for gravity-defying science
[9]Scientists strangely unable to follow recipe for holy grail room-temp superconductor
[10]NASA awards $150 million to prototype tech for humans on the Moon, and above it
Varda already had [11]three missions under its belt before getting the all-clear to carry on firing laboratory equipment into space. The first, which lifted off in June 2023, [12]crystallized a form of the anti-AIDS drug Ritonavir.
"We are focused on our core competencies in the life sciences as far as our internal research goes," Brandi Sippel, Varda's VP of Mission Management, told us. "However, we proudly serve government partners through our hypersonic testbed, and we’re happy to host payloads from researchers in other fields who want to recover their experiments quickly, iterate, and send something up again."
[13]
Varda’s second mission carried a payload from the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) designed to monitor the effects of high-speed reentry into Earth’s atmosphere. The space company’s craft clocks Mach 25 (19,000 mph) as it de-orbits. Space boffins will use data derived from those dives to design better thermal shielding for hypersonic travel.
The third mission also carried AFRL hardware, this time an Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) that measured the accuracy of navigation tools at reentry speeds. That's going to be vital in aiming hypersonic machinery operating at high-Mach numbers.
The fourth and fifth missions scheduled for 2025 will be the first on which Vanta builds its own capsule, rather than outsourcing it to Rocket Lab. The capsule uses a Conformal Phenolic Impregnated Carbon Ablator, a special form of heat shield developed by NASA that keeps instrumentation and the product of manufacturing in a stable condition during the intense heat of reentry.
[14]
"One day we intend to have daily reentries – while we’re launching and reentering quarterly now, we only expect that to increase," Sippel predicted.
NASA's [15]research shows that orbital manufacturing could have real benefits due to lower gravity and the way different materials operate in such environments - for example sediment formation is reduced and thermal stresses differ from here on Earth. ®
Get our [16]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/22/faa_now_requires_reentry_vehicles/
[2] https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-14/chapter-III/subchapter-C/part-450
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aFPfukfyKu-dPv7f3h6sbQAAAkY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
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[6] https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/statements/general-statements
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/22/faa_now_requires_reentry_vehicles/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/02/23/materials_processed_in_space_return/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/08/07/lk_99_superconductor_tests_inconclusive/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/26/nasa_moon_funding/
[11] https://www.varda.com/platform
[12] https://chemrxiv.org/engage/chemrxiv/article-details/65faecbee9ebbb4db91b4ac1
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aFPfukfyKu-dPv7f3h6sbQAAAkY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aFPfukfyKu-dPv7f3h6sbQAAAkY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[15] https://osf.io/preprints/osf/d6ar4_v1
[16] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/