Posted on 04/08/2008 2:55:24 PM PDT by BenLurkin
When XCOR Aerospace last week unveiled the design of its suborbital spacecraft, intended to offer a glimpse of black sky and the Earth below to space tourists, one of those excited about the opportunity to experience what few have before was Esther Dyson.
Dyson, of EDventure Holdings, ... is one of the investors who will help make it possible.
Dyson is an angel investor, an individual who provides seed money for a young company, typically bridging the gap between self-funding and the later, larger investment by venture capitalists.
"She has a knack for finding what's new and different in technology," said XCOR spokesman Douglas Graham in introducing Dyson during the company's press conference to unveil its spacecraft, the Lynx.
Dyson has a successful history of investing in information technology and Internet start-ups, including the popular Internet photo site Flickr, and has begun focusing on the private space travel industry.
"When I was a kid growing up, I took it for granted I would be going to the moon," Dyson said.
However, she compared space travel to date to the priesthood, in that it was reserved for an elite few, "not for normal folks," she said.
Now, companies such as Mojave-based XCOR are proposing to bring space travel to the larger public.
XCOR's rocketplane, dubbed the Lynx Mark 1, will carry the pilot and a single passenger to the edge of space before gliding to an unpowered runway landing.
The Lynx will take off horizontally from a standard airport runway under rocket power and quickly climb to 138,000 feet at speeds reaching Mach 2 before gliding the remaining distance to 200,000 feet. There passengers will experience between one and two minutes of weightlessness.
The company expects to begin flight-testing the vehicle in 2010 in Mojave
(Excerpt) Read more at avpress.com ...
Dumbing down the term "space travel"!
Esther Dyson certainly qualifies as
“smart money”.
Good luck to XCOR!
... and to all who are trying to wrest space travel
out of the hands of the state monopoly.
It’s not space travel but a good ride all the same.
—Walt Disney
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