Chris Kemp on Astra's Comeback, Rockets and Drones from Space
If you’ve seen HBO’s Wild, Wild Space or read When the Heavens Went on Sale, then Chris Kemp needs no introduction. Kemp is one of the stars in both works. For the less familiar, Kemp is the co-founder and CEO of Astra Space, a maker of rockets based in Alameda, Calif. For several years now, Astra has been on a quest to create the cheapest, easiest to launch rocket in the market and to turn rocket-making into a mass production affair. The company has enjoyed glorious highs all the way to orbit and lows where it verged on bankruptcy. Over the past year, Kemp and Astra co-founder Adam London took the company private and raised a fresh $80 million as they head toward flying Rocket 4 - their next-generation machine. We have lots more on that story here. In this episode, we get into Astra’s tumultuous journey with Kemp, his disdain for some of my filmmaking choices and the future of rockets. He envisions a world with rocket launch sites in many countries and rockets ferrying things like drones into battles in far-off places in a matter of seconds. As always, you can listen here or via your favorite podcast provider. And we have a YouTube channel with the podcasts and our latest science and tech videos. Leave a review. Like and subscribe. Calm our souls. Most of all - enjoy! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.corememory.com/subscribe