#39 Josh Western, Space Forge: in-space manufacturing

This week I sat down with Josh Western, CEO of the UK-based space startup Space Forge, who are developing a spacecraft platform for in-space manufacturing. This is a really exciting field of commercial space activity, which is starting to happen in earnest now! https://spaceforge.co.uk/

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The Space Business Podcast is sponsored by NanoAvionics and produced in partnership with the International Space University (ISU). Follow the podcast on Twitter @podcast_space

If you got interested in learning more about the business opportunities in space, check out my online course at https://www.udemy.com/course/space-entrepreneurship/

If you speak German, also check out my recently published introductory book on the space economy.

Episode notes

0:00 Intro

2:08 Elevator Pitch

3:36 Space Forge origin story

6:25 Why would someone produce something in space just to bring it back to Earth?

9:00 Examples of Space Manufacturing use cases

15:08 Economic Viability

18:34 Previous Experiments and Space Manufacturing Proof of Concept

19:40 The transition from the experimental phase to industrial scale producing

25:15 Re-entry

27:41 How flexible is the Space Forge platform?

30:09 Space Forge business model

35:31 Potential Space manufacturing platforms

41:12 Timetable for first flight

42:36 Vision for the company

44:03 In-space manufacturing for space

47:23 Wales

50:32 Space Forge is hiring right now! https://spaceforge.co.uk/

51:10 Sci-Fi