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Nevada-Based Bigelow Aerospace Lays Off Entire Workforce

posted by martyb on Tuesday March 24 2020, @05:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the future-is-up-in-the-air dept.

takyon writes:

Bigelow Aerospace lays off entire workforce

Bigelow Aerospace, the company founded more than two decades ago to develop commercial space habitats, laid off all its employees March 23 in a move caused at least in part by the coronavirus pandemic.

According to sources familiar with the company's activities, Bigelow Aerospace's 68 employees were informed that they were being laid off, effective immediately. An additional 20 employees were laid off the previous week.

Those sources said that the company, based in North Las Vegas, Nevada, was halting operations because of what one person described as a "perfect storm of problems" that included the coronavirus pandemic. On March 20, Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak signed an emergency directive ordering all "nonessential" businesses to close.

[...] Robert Bigelow said in a Jan. 28 interview that his company declined to submit a proposal [for an ISS commercial module] to NASA because of financing concerns. NASA, at the time of the competition, said it projected providing up to $561 million to support both a commercial ISS module as well as a separate solicitation for a free-flying facility. "That was asking just too much" of the company, Bigelow said. "So we told NASA we had to bow out."

Previously:
Bigelow Expandable Activity Module to Continue Stay at the International Space Station
Bigelow and ULA to Put Inflatable Module in Orbit Around the Moon by 2022
Bigelow Aerospace Forms New Company to Manage Space Stations, Announces Gigantic Inflatable Module
Bigelow Aerospace Unveils B330 Inflatable Module Mock-Up

Related:
Sierra Nevada Corporation Shows Off an Inflatable Habitat
Expanding, And Eventually Replacing, The International Space Station

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 24 2020, @06:47PM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 24 2020, @06:47PM (#975140)

    Typically "perfect storm" refers to multiple things that happen to occur at the same time resulting in an event that wouldn't normally have happened, or wouldn't have been as bad. All the article mentions is the covid-related closing and a reference to a proposal call that they didn't pursue. So what else was it? What makes up this storm?

    • (Score: 4, Interesting) by Immerman on Tuesday March 24 2020, @07:27PM (1 child)

      by Immerman (3985) on Tuesday March 24 2020, @07:27PM (#975156)

      I'm curious as well, but it would seem they declined to make it public. The fact that they declined to submit an ISS proposal last year - on what would pretty much the only near-term contract they're likely to get - would seem to suggest that they've been facing ongoing financial and/or technological challenges since well before COVID was a concern. Given the admiral performance of BEAM to date, I would guess the technology itself is probably ready, though they may be having issues scaling up production to a much larger module - as least cost-effectively enough to be able to make money off a NASA contract.

      It does answer my previously lingering question as to why Bigelow wasn't selected for the ISS expansion - at least as to why NASA would select some completely unproven company over Bigelow's impressive promise.

      A real shame - they've been developing these inflatable habitats all this time, only to stumble just as the opportunities are finally starting to heat up.

      Or, perhaps this was an excuse to clear out the scientists and engineers now that the technology is mature, and start focussing on production? Might have been systemic personnel issues as well.

      Laying off *everyone* though... that's something serious.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 24 2020, @08:30PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 24 2020, @08:30PM (#975180)

        I agree, there is more to this story than being said.

        It has to be damn hard to propose something you haven't built and go up against TRL-9 technology in BEAM. Maybe Bigelow really really wants to go after the free-flyer proposal and he knows he's too small to win both. Or maybe Axiom grossly underbid with the expectation they'll get more money later. Some interesting notes about Axiom [spacenews.com]:

        Axiom was founded in 2016 by Kam Ghaffarian, who previously led space industry engineering services company Stinger Ghaffarian Technologies, and Michael Suffredini, who was program manager for the ISS at NASA for a decade prior to his retirement from the agency in 2015. The company has several former astronauts in leadership positions, including former NASA administrator Charles Bolden, listed as a “business development consultant” on the company’s website.

        Axiom says it believes that experience, as well as an industry team that includes Boeing, Thales Alenia Space Italy, Intuitive Machines and Maxar Technologies, played a key role in its selection. “There is a fantastically steep learning curve to human spaceflight,” Suffredini, president and chief executive of Axiom, said in a company statement. “The collective experience at Axiom is quite far along it. Because we know firsthand what works and what doesn’t in LEO, we are innovating in terms of design, engineering and process while maintaining safety and dramatically lowering costs.”

        And this:

        NASA did not disclose in its statement why it selected Axiom for the module. The agency’s statement did feature laudatory comments from Texas’ two senators, John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, as well as Rep. Brian Babin, whose district includes Axiom’s headquarters near the Johnson Space Center.

        I can see laying off the whole company while closed (although I don't agree with that). I guess we'll see who gets hired back when this is over and they're ramping up for the free-flying station proposal to be released.

        Or (and the cynic in me thinks this is the reason), that Axiom was wired to win it all along, and Bigelow either knew that, or was told that, and gracefully exited the process (with a promise to be awarded the next one?).

    • (Score: 2, Interesting) by khallow on Tuesday March 24 2020, @09:13PM (1 child)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday March 24 2020, @09:13PM (#975203) Journal
      Sounds more like a failing company with the exact date of failure dependent on a triggering mechanism, like covid-related shutdowns.

      • (Score: 2) by Reziac on Wednesday March 25 2020, @02:40AM

        by Reziac (2489) on Wednesday March 25 2020, @02:40AM (#975302) Homepage

        Yeah, or the venture capital ran out.

        --
        And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by ElizabethGreene on Wednesday March 25 2020, @12:11AM (1 child)

    by ElizabethGreene (6748) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 25 2020, @12:11AM (#975262) Journal

    The glassdoor reviews for this company are enlightening reading as to the underlying cause of this failure.

    • (Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday March 25 2020, @12:48AM

      by takyon (881) <takyonNO@SPAMsoylentnews.org> on Wednesday March 25 2020, @12:48AM (#975275) Journal

      I JUST REMEMBERED THIS THING:

      Glowing Auras and ‘Black Money’: The Pentagon’s Mysterious U.F.O. Program [archive.is]

      The shadowy program — parts of it remain classified — began in 2007, and initially it was largely funded at the request of Harry Reid, the Nevada Democrat who was the Senate majority leader at the time and who has long had an interest in space phenomena. Most of the money went to an aerospace research company run by a billionaire entrepreneur and longtime friend of Mr. Reid’s, Robert Bigelow, who is currently working with NASA to produce expandable craft for humans to use in space.

      On CBS’s “60 Minutes” in May, Mr. Bigelow said he was “absolutely convinced” that aliens exist and that U.F.O.s have visited Earth.

      Working with Mr. Bigelow’s Las Vegas-based company, the program produced documents that describe sightings of aircraft that seemed to move at very high velocities with no visible signs of propulsion, or that hovered with no apparent means of lift.

      [...] Mr. Reid said his interest in U.F.O.s came from Mr. Bigelow. In 2007, Mr. Reid said in the interview, Mr. Bigelow told him that an official with the Defense Intelligence Agency had approached him wanting to visit Mr. Bigelow’s ranch in Utah, where he conducted research.
      Mr. Reid said he met with agency officials shortly after his meeting with Mr. Bigelow and learned that they wanted to start a research program on U.F.O.s. Mr. Reid then summoned Mr. Stevens and Mr. Inouye to a secure room in the Capitol.

      [...] Contracts obtained by The Times show a congressional appropriation of just under $22 million beginning in late 2008 through 2011. The money was used for management of the program, research and assessments of the threat posed by the objects.

      The funding went to Mr. Bigelow’s company, Bigelow Aerospace, which hired subcontractors and solicited research for the program.

      Under Mr. Bigelow’s direction, the company modified buildings in Las Vegas for the storage of metal alloys and other materials that Mr. Elizondo and program contractors said had been recovered from unidentified aerial phenomena. Researchers also studied people who said they had experienced physical effects from encounters with the objects and examined them for any physiological changes. In addition, researchers spoke to military service members who had reported sightings of strange aircraft.

      [...] “Internationally, we are the most backward country in the world on this issue,” Mr. Bigelow said in an interview. “Our scientists are scared of being ostracized, and our media is scared of the stigma. China and Russia are much more open and work on this with huge organizations within their countries. Smaller countries like Belgium, France, England and South American countries like Chile are more open, too. They are proactive and willing to discuss this topic, rather than being held back by a juvenile taboo.”

      Adjust your conspiracy theories accordingly.

      --
      [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2020, @09:17PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2020, @09:17PM (#975607)

    Use it to advance your agenda.

    Perhaps the virus helped Bigelow with unemployment costs that were going to happen anyway?

    See also diversion of aid to keep companies and employees viable used for stock buybacks and bonuses.

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