看SpaceX的真正價值 要看它的競爭對手

Last week, rumors concerning the value of Elon Musk’s SpaceX rippled across the Web after tech startup-watcher TechCrunch reported that private investment in the company valued it at “somewhere south of $10 billion.” SpaceX quickly quashed the rumor. “SpaceX is not currently raising any funding nor has any external valuation of that magnitude or higher been done,” a company spokesman said in a statement. And so SpaceX ended the week just as it began it, despite having briefly enjoyed the status of a $10 billion industry behemoth.

私營航天業非常不透明，SpaceX又口風甚嚴，再加上風投領域的小道消息看起來很不可靠，這讓人們很難對它進行解讀。同樣的，該公司的自我描述也不一定能成爲對它進行評價的依據（埃隆o穆斯克說SpaceX將在未來10年裏登陸火星。該公司總裁格溫o肖特韋爾則放言，到2100年SpaceX將成爲太陽系運輸領域的主導者。在這兩個時點之間，SpaceX還打算把火箭有效載荷提高到58.5噸）。評估該公司當前價值和升值潛力的最佳途徑也許不是金錢或者豪言壯語，而是觀察這一業界新貴對商業航天領域的競爭對手產生了怎樣的影響。

The private spaceflight industry is so opaque and SpaceX’s cards are so closely held that it is difficult to get a read on the company, especially using the venture capital rumor mill. Nor can one necessarily judge SpaceX based on what the company says about itself. (Elon Musk says that the company is headed to Mars in the next decade. SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell boasts that by 2100 the company will dominate transportation across the solar system. Between them is a 58.5-ton payload of ambition.) Perhaps the best way to evaluate SpaceX and its potential value isn’t in dollar figures or in audacious claims, but by observing what the upstart space firm is already doing to its competition in the commercial space industry.

20世紀80年代初，美國退出了商業航天市場。從那時起，商業航天器發射領域基本上就處於被歐洲公司壟斷的狀態，比如法國的Arianespace[法國航空業巨頭空中客車（Airbus）持有部分股份]和International Launch Services[美俄合資，採用俄羅斯質子號（Proton）運載火箭的技術發射衛星]。儘管SpaceX通過爲國際空間站（International Space Station）運送補給從美國國家航空航天局（NASA）獲得了很大一部分收入，但在該公司截至2018年的40多次發射任務中，價值2000億美元的衛星發射市場也佔了很大的比重，而且這個比例還在不斷上升。

That competition—mostly European space launch providers like France’s Arianespace (partially owned by French aerospace giant Airbus) and International Launch Services (a U.S.-Russia joint venture that launches satellites aboard Russian Proton launch technology)—has largely held a monopoly on commercial space launches since the U.S. retreated from the industry in the early 1980s. Though SpaceX derives a chunk of its income from NASA in exchange for resupplying the International Space Station, the $200 billion satellite industry makes up a huge and growing chunk of SpaceX’s nearly 40-strong launch manifest through 2018.

SpaceX的航天器發射價格有時僅僅爲傳統競爭對手的一半，這讓它在較短時間裏成功實現了很高的市場佔有率。該公司安全記錄良好，業界對其核心業務的信心也不斷增強。今年夏天，SpaceX爲在德克薩斯州南部建立自己的專用發射場鋪平了道路，並且開始實驗火箭循環使用技術，這有可能大幅降低發射成本。

By offering space launch services at prices that in some cases undercut the traditional launch industry by half, SpaceX has managed significant market penetration in a relatively short period of time. It has a strong safety record and industry confidence in its core services is growing. Over the summer the company cleared the path toward construction of its own dedicated launch facility in southern Texas while also experimenting with reusable rocket stage technology that could reduce launch costs by an order of magnitude.

如果SpaceX在歐洲等地的競爭對手相信所有這些都只是炒作，那它們表達這種態度的方式也太奇怪了。就算不仔細觀察也能發現，這些公司看來正在慌忙展開行動。

In January, the president of the French national space agency (and former Arianespace CEO) wrote an op-ed in France’s Le Monde detailing all the things SpaceX has done right, calling on the European space industry to adapt as quickly as possible. In February, Arianespace’s current chairman and CEO Stephane Israel told the European Space Agency that it may need additional subsidies from European governments in order to remain a viable competitor, citing the arrival of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 medium-lift rocket as the cause of its competitive headaches. At the Berlin Airshow in July, Airbus Group CEO Tom Enders urged Europe to completely overhaul its space launcher industry, mentioning SpaceX and CEO Elon Musk by name. “Musk gives us the opportunity to shake up what has been quite a successful European space industry,” Enders told Reuters. “We either much improve and integrate our industrial structures or we’ll become irrelevant.”

今年1月份，法國國家宇航局總裁（曾任Arianespace首席執行官）在法國《世界報》（Le Monde）發表社論文章，詳細列舉了SpaceX採取過的正確措施，並敦促歐洲航天業儘快效仿。2月份，Arianespace現任董事長兼首席執行官斯塔費恩o伊斯雷爾向歐洲航天局（European Space Agency）表示，自己的公司可能需要歐洲政府提供更多補貼，以便保持足夠的競爭力。他說，SpaceX推出獵鷹9號（Falcon 9）中型運載火箭對Arianespace構成了相當大的競爭壓力。在7月份的柏林國際航空航天展上，空客集團（Airbus Group）CEO湯姆o恩德斯敦促歐洲航天器發射企業進行徹底革新，並且提到了SpaceX及其首席執行官埃隆o穆斯克。恩德斯在接受路透社（Reuters）採訪時表示：“雖然歐洲航天業一直都相當成功，而穆斯克給我們帶來了對它進行重整的機會。我們得大幅改進並整合這個行業的結構，不然就會變得無足輕重。”

It’s not just talk coming out of the global space industry. In July Arianespace cut its launch prices in an effort to minimize SpaceX’s market advantage, though its prices are reportedly still nowhere near as low as SpaceX’s. Airbus and Safran, a French propulsion systems maker, have entered into a 50-50 joint venture aimed at designing a new, less costly rocket for Europe. Several European space officials and potential future customers have called for a rethinking and possible redesign of Arianespace’s new Ariane 6 rocket.

這些航天公司不光是嘴上說說而已。7月份，Arianespace下調了航天器發射價格，目的是儘量削弱SpaceX在市場上的優勢。但據報道，和SpaceX的低廉價格相比，Arianespace還差得很遠。空客和法國推進系統製造商賽峯集團（Safran）已經建立了一家合資公司，雙方各出資一半。這家合資公司旨在爲歐洲設計一款成本較低的新型火箭。歐洲航天部門的幾名官員和一些潛在未來客戶都已要求Arianespace重新考慮乃至重新設計它新推出的阿麗亞娜6型（Ariane 6）火箭。

Back in the U.S., competitors that have traditionally enjoyed non-competitive launch markets have found themselves forced to respond to SpaceX. Earlier this year SpaceX sued the United States Air Force over an $11 billion contract awarded to Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture United Launch Alliance (ULA) for a block of military satellite launches. SpaceX claims the contract was awarded through a bidding process that was not competitive, and a federal judge has ordered a review of the dealings. Even as it was suing the Air Force, SpaceX still managed to receive USAF certification to launch military hardware aboard it Falcon 9 rocket.

美國方面，以往在航天器發射領域從未遇到過競爭的那些公司發現，自己必須針對SpaceX採取相應措施。今年早些時候，SpaceX把美國空軍告上了法庭，原因是後者將一系列軍事衛星發射任務交給了波音（Boeing）和洛克希德-馬丁（Lockheed Martin）設立的合資公司United Launch Alliance（ULA）。SpaceX提出，這份合同在招標時並沒有採用競爭的方式。一名聯邦法院法官已經下令就此進行審查。就算雙方正在打官司，SpaceX還是通過了美國空軍的認證，從而有資格用自己的獵鷹9號火箭發射軍用航天器。

“While the European Space Agency, Arianespace, Safran may not have taken SpaceX seriously before, those entities certainly are taking SpaceX seriously now,” says Richard David, co-founder and CEO of commercial space industry analysis firm NewSpace Global, whose global ranking of private space companies places SpaceX at the very top. “NSG analysts track around 700 companies worldwide, and it’s not just about SpaceX and its European launch competitors. But SpaceX is ranked number one for a reason.”

在商業航天業分析機構NewSpace Global（簡稱：NSG）的私營航天公司排行榜上，SpaceX高居榜首。NSG聯合創始人兼首席執行官理查德o戴維說：“雖然歐洲航天局、Arianespace和賽峯以前可能沒把它當回事，但現在它們一定嚴陣以待。我們的分析師追蹤全球約700家公司，不光是SpaceX和它的歐洲競爭對手。但SpaceX獨佔鰲頭有它的道理。”

The fact that absolutely no one in the business of launching payloads into space has been able to ignore SpaceX as it piles success upon success says more about the company and its future prospects than any rumored dollar valuation. And just as important to SpaceX’s future prospects is the global aerospace industry’s inability to respond. The high costs and myriad challenges inherent in the commercial spaceflight industry—this is, quite literally, rocket science—means that most of SpaceX’scompetitors are either joint ventures like ULA and Airbus-Safran or large, bureaucratic, multinationals like Arianespace, which counts two dozen major shareholders from nearly a dozen European states all asserting influence and competing interests into the company calculus.

在航天器發射領域，絕對沒有誰能對接二連三獲得成功的SpaceX視而不見，這比任何估值傳聞都能更好地體現SpaceX的現狀和未來。同時，世界上其他航天公司無力對SpaceX進行反擊，這對該公司的未來前景同樣重要。商業航天代價昂貴而且挑戰紛繁，這是名副其實的“高科技”，這也意味着SpaceX的大多數競爭對手要麼是合資企業，就像ULA以及空客和賽峯的合資公司，要麼就是像Arianespace那樣的官僚型跨國公司，它們有二十幾個大股東，來自十幾個歐洲國家，這些股東都想對公司產生影響，又都在其中爭奪利益。

“They’re already responding, or trying to figure out the best way to respond,” says Kate Maliga, an industry analyst at aerospace and defense analysts Tauri Group, of SpaceX’s competitors. “But it’s hard, especially with the complicated structure of European governments and industry. There’s very little they can do in the next year or two, but they feel like they need to respond and they will try.”

航天和軍工分析機構Tauri Group的行業分析師凱特o馬利加說：“它們已經開始採取對策，或者正在尋找最佳的應對方法。但這很難，特別是考慮到歐洲政府和行業的複雜結構。今後一、兩年它們基本上將束手無策，但它們覺得自己需要這樣做，而且也會進行嘗試。”

SpaceX may seem to be riding as its competitors struggle to adapt, but the company has by no means conquered the industry, Maliga says. Satellite companies are by nature risk-averse, and no company wants to have only one launch provider handling all of its multimillion-dollar hardware. Though SpaceX continues to build industry confidence, Arianespace already has a decades-long established record of launching successfully and on time—the latter something SpaceX has struggled with. For satellite television providers broadcasting the World Cup, for instance, a delay in launching a satellite can cost many more millions than the price disparity between Arianespace and SpaceX, Maliga says. Which means SpaceX’s successes do not spell doom for its more expensive competitors, at least not yet.

馬利加指出，在競爭對手難以招架之際，SpaceX看起來也許一帆風順，但無論如何也不能說它已經征服了這個行業。衛星公司本質上都厭惡風險，而且沒有哪家公司願意把自己價值數百億美元的設備都交給同一家發射服務供應商。儘管SpaceX讓業界對它越來越有信心，但幾十年來，Arianespace一直都能做到成功而準時地發射，而SpaceX在準時方面做得並不如意。馬利加舉例說，對於轉播世界盃賽事的衛視來說，衛星發射受到延誤所產生的成本可能比Arianespace和SpaceX之間價差要多得多。也就是說，SpaceX的成功並不會讓要價較高的競爭對手遭受滅頂之災，至少現在還沒有。

“I don’t see anyone being an absolute existential threat to anyone at this point,” Jon Beland, a senior analyst at defense and aerospace industry consultancy Avascent, says. “The launch industry has historically undergone cycles where new entrants enter the field and shuffle the cards around. It’s still too early to tell.”

軍工和航天業諮詢機構Avascent高級分析師喬恩o貝蘭德指出：“目前還沒有誰能給別人帶來生死攸關的威脅。航天器發射領域會在行業新軍到來後重新洗牌，歷史上這種情況反覆出現。現在下結論還爲時過早。”