Considered in a theoretical vacuum, the two significant aeronautical events that took place on Sunday - a rocket launch and the landing of another type of aircraft - might seem worrying for NASA, given that the respective aircrafts were designed, built, and operated by private firms.
Except Sunday's triumph was, in a way, NASA's too.
According to Forbes, the weekend's activities were a result of a NASA program implemented in 2006 to create a market for private companies to invest in the previously government-centric world of space exploration. The Commercial Orbital Transport Services Program (COTSP), consists of a $700 million dollar investment that's already paying dividends for NASA, the U.S. economy, space enthusiasts, and billionaire Pay Pal co founder Elon Musk.
The two companies that have benefited from the COTSP supplement NASA and the U.S. space program in several key ways. Both are already equipped to launch certain NASA vessels while providing necessary back up materials for military launches.
Though critics point out that NASA's involvement with such companies distracts the space agency from some of its own goals.
According to Forbes, the greatest current beneficiary of NASA's plan is the U.S. economy. Work that was previously outsourced to foreign governments now remains within the nation's borders. One of the companies, Space Exploration Technology, headed by Musk has created over 3,000 jobs. In turn, Musk's net worth has doubled.
"Most important," writes the Forbes article co-authors Greg Autry, an adjunct professor with the Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at the Marshall School of Business, USC, and Laura Huang, an assistant professor of management and entrepreneurship at the Wharton School, "it will bring market forces to bear on the high-costs of space travel and deliver the sort of completely unpredictable benefits that emerged when we privatized the Internet."
