Four private Chinese companies schedule orbital rocket launch attempts next 2 years

[gary]

In a 26 Apr 2019 article at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
(IEEE) Spectrum magazine web site, Andrew Jones reports on how more than
ten private companies in China are working on space launch vehicles or
their components and that four are now prepared to make their first
attempts to reach orbit.

Originally Posted by Andrew Jones, IEEE Spectrum, 26th April 2019

In the early years of rocketry at Caltech, there was no figure more influential than the Chinese cyberneticist Qian Xuesen. Then, in 1955, the United States repatriated him to China, suspecting him of being a spy.

Qian returned to China to become the father of the country’s space-launch vehicle and ballistic-missile programs and contributed greatly to the “Two Bombs, One Satellite” nuclear weapons and space project. And his efforts were not wasted—on 9 March of this year, the People’s Republic of China launched its 300th Long March rocket, which put China’s 506th spacecraft into orbit.

To do more exploration at a lower cost, the Chinese government has initiated policies aimed at establishing a private space industry like the one that exists in the United States, where companies such as SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Rocket Lab are bringing low-cost launch services to the space sector.

In 2014, China’s State Council issued a proposal called Document 60 that would open the nation’s launch and small satellite sectors to private capital. The government followed this announcement with helpful policies, including a national civil-military integration strategy to transfer crucial, complex, and sensitive technologies from state-owned space sector giants to startups approved by authorities.

Article here :-
https://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/...-race-to-orbit

[multiweb (Marc)]

Seems like the line between military and private business is getting blurrier every day. Bit of a worry.