Will the SOAR Spaceplane be developped and be sucessful?

[fredinno]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOAR_%28spaceplane%29#Completed

http://www.s-3.ch/en/home

http://www.s-3.ch/en/home/2015/10/27/the-chinese-company-recon-s3-have-signed-a-strategic-cooperation-agreement-to-develop-low-cost-orbit-satellite-delivery

SOAR is a private Swiss spaceplane project that uses an air-launched rocket to launch a unmanned Hermes-derived spacecraft and a small expendable upper stage to send 250 kg smallsats to LEO, or a manned hermes-derived vehicle for supersonic transport.

They also have support by the Chinese satellite company RECON, but the project has also been delayed.

Is it a potentially successful endevour, or is it doomed?

Edited March 2, 2016 by fredinno

[Nibb31]

It's just another of those "new space" businesses. You've got to understand that the main business model of these companies is to design powerpoint rockets to attract venture capital and subsidies. That pays a salary to a CEO and sometimes a small team of engineers who come up with trade studies and CGI to attract more VC... until it wears out. Sometimes they buy outdated hardware or a couple of patents in order to look serious, but companies like this have come and gone for decades.

Despite the plethora of "new space" launch companies that are coming up with small sat LEO launchers, there is still zero demand.

I'm also dubious about that little tiny spaceplane carrying enough dV to reach the Karman line, let alone LEO. The original Spiral spaceplane that used a similar configuration needed to carry a frigging huge drop tank, but I guess the powerpoints wouldn't look as sexy.

[fredinno]

11 minutes ago, Nibb31 said:

It's just another of those "new space" businesses. You've got to understand that the main business model of these companies is to design powerpoint rockets to attract venture capital and subsidies. That pays a salary to a CEO and sometimes a small team of engineers who come up with trade studies and CGI to attract more VC... until it wears out. Sometimes they buy outdated hardware or a couple of patents in order to look serious, but companies like this have come and gone for decades.

Despite the plethora of "new space" launch companies that are coming up with small sat LEO launchers, there is still zero demand.

I'm also dubious about that little tiny spaceplane carrying enough dV to reach the Karman line, let alone LEO. The original Spiral spaceplane that used a similar configuration needed to carry a frigging huge drop tank, but I guess the powerpoints wouldn't look as sexy.

There was supposed to be an additional upper stage attached to the Hermes. But yeah, you're probably right/

[wumpus]

The "expendable upper stage" sounded odd.  Best guess is that anything that needed to be sent to orbit gets tossed out at the Karman line and the "expendable upper stage" is essentially a payload assist module that goes all the way to orbit.  Don't expect to see it in the various renderings as it will appear way too big (when shown to scale).

The CEO and crew must be pretty persuasive.  I can't see this company making a profit even if a magic venture cap fairy swooped down and provided a working first spaceplane, there's too much competition (mostly Virgin Galactic) and too little market.