Environmental Health & Safety Intern

2 spacecraft in orbit and 8 more coming soon: Varda has big plans for in-space manufacturing. Published 3 hours ago "It's humanity's first time launching multiple commercial reentry vehicles simultaneously." Reentry and orbital-manufacturing provider Varda Space Industries is operating two spacecraft in orbit right now, with another expected to launch "in the coming days" and seven more next year. The Los Angeles-area startup, which bills itself as one of just two companies that can currently do commercial reentry from space, successfully launched its latest two refrigerator-sized spacecraft aboard SpaceX's Transporter-18 rideshare mission on Oct. 1. "It's humanity's first time launching multiple commercial reentry vehicles simultaneously," Varda CEO Will Bruey told Space.com on Tuesday (Oct. 7) of the Transporter-18 launch. SpaceX launches Google AI prototype satellite and 129 other payloads A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched 130 payloads to orbit including a prototype Google AI satellite from California's Vandenberg Space Force Base on Oct. 1, 2026 at 2:32 p.m. EDT (1832 GMT; 11:32 a.m. local California time). According to Space.com, the highest-profile payload of the Transporter-18 mission is a pathfinder spacecraft for Project Suncatcher, the AI constellation that Google plans to build and operate in low Earth orbit (LEO). Credit: SpaceX The payloads on the Transporter-18 Varda craft ranged from pharmaceuticals to demo navigation systems to exterior thermal-protection materials. The company bills its spacecraft as mini-factories, which can host the orbital production of valuable goods such as pharmaceuticals and then bring them safely down to Earth. Another Varda vehicle is scheduled to follow them into space later this month. Assuming the third spacecraft launches nominally, all three will come down before Christmas in the Koonibba Test Range in the South Australian Outback, through coordination with Varda's long-time space-mission service provider, Southern Launch. And things are scheduled to ramp up quickly: Varda aims to fly seven more missions in 2027: two in Quarter 1 (Q1), two in Q2 and three in Q3 (the latter three being all on the same rocket). "As we scale up, we care about our ability to fly and fly regularly," Bruey said, emphasizing that the company is now treating its missions less as one-offs and more as a series. "It is, first and foremost, taking that unique [spacecraft] technology and moving into a fleet mentality, rather than a space mission mentality." Like any startup finding its footing, Varda's challenges in the coming months will be scaling safely and efficiently. But the company says it is well-capitalized to do so, and has a big hiring campaign underway. It also has been spending money on slight upgrades and improvements to its vehicles, as well as mission operations and other infrastructure to run several missions at the same time, with more funds having just arrived. In September, Varda announced it had raised $251 million in "Series D" investment funding and will be hiring 100 people by the end of 2027, boosting its current 286-employee base by more than a third. Most of the employees work out of El Segundo, California, with a few in sales offices in Washington, D.C. and Huntsville, Alabama (where U.S. Space Command is gradually moving, along with some defense contractors, from Colorado Springs). In the further future, Bruey said, the goal is to fly Varda vehicles into space daily, using a "standardized product" that would be put together on an assembly line. But to get to that point, like other companies in the industry, Varda will need to get through an anticipated rocket shortage beginning in about 2029. SpaceX is by far the most active launcher these days, and it has been the dominant provider for companies like Varda via its Transporter and Bandwagon rideshare programs. But SpaceX is readying to retire its Falcon 9 rocket as it transitions more resources into Starship, the fully reusable megarocket the company sees as its workhorse of the future. Media reports suggest that SpaceX is pretty much out of capacity for Falcon 9 rockets flying through the end of service in 2028 or 2029, although slots are still available through third-party bookers. Varda Space capsule returns to Earth in amazing one-minute time-lapse Varda Space Industries' W-1 mission landed in northern Utah this on Feb 21, 2024. Watch the re-entry, parachute deploy and landing in this time-lapse The capsule was carrying Earth crystals of an antiviral drug that were grown in orbit. Credit: Varda Space There are a slew of newer rockets under production (such as Blue Origin's New Glenn and Relativity Space's Terran R), though they are far less mature and in some cases, even unflown. This is creating uncertainty about how much capacity there will be in the industry in the short term, but Varda said it is planning well ahead for that moment - and so too are its customers. "We're stacked with launches from now through that 2029 time frame," Bruey said. The company's current generation of vehicles is "launch-agnostic," although the next generation is aiming to be even more so to nab opportunities from small rockets up to Starship. The company said that, as long as Varda and its customers have access to microgravity, the shipping methodology - much like shipping on Earth - should not matter, and Varda aims to make the experience that seamless for its customers. But in the meantime, the company says it will fly as much as possible and (like everyone else) do what it can to secure slots on launching rockets after Falcon 9 retires. Contributing Writer Elizabeth Howell (she/her), Ph.D., was a staff writer in the spaceflight channel between 2022 and 2024 specializing in Canadian space news. She was contributing writer for Space.com for 10 years from 2012 to 2024. Elizabeth's reporting includes multiple exclusives with the White House, leading world coverage about a lost-and-found space tomato on the International Space Station, witnessing five human spaceflight launches on two continents, flying parabolic, working inside a spacesuit, and participating in a simulated Mars mission. Her latest book, "Why Am I Taller?" (ECW Press, 2022) is co-written with astronaut Dave Williams.

Varda raises $251M to leverage gravity in space for drug production. October 2, 2026 | Capitalizing on space's microgravity, the United Therapeutics-partnered Varda Space Industries aims to make medicines with better bioavailability and stability than Earth-produced molecules. Varda Space Industries has raised $251 million to manufacture medicines in space for patients on Earth. Lux Capital and Natural Capital co-led the series D round for Varda, valuing the company at $1.6 billion, Reuters reported on Wednesday. Varda, which was set up in 2021 by former SpaceX engineer Will Bruey and Founders Fund partner Delian Asparouhov, has now raised $598 million in total since its founding. The California-based startup launched its first mission in 2023 and has completed six successful reentries. Varda has booked 28 launches with SpaceX and other providers between 2027 and 2029, Reuters reported on Wednesday. The support reflects the belief that Varda is "the first and only company delivering a real cadence of launches and reentries," Shahin Farshchi, partner at Lux Capital, said in a prepared statement. Space's lower levels of gravity, which make objects seem weightless, influence crystal formation in ways that could affect drug properties such as stability and bioavailability. Evidence of the microgravity's effect on drug molecules has fueled decades of research. NASA sponsored a report on the topic in 1978, and Merck's space station research informed its subcutaneous Keytruda formulation. With the cost of sending a kilogram to orbit falling 96% from 1960 to 2025 and forecast to drop further through 2040, one barrier to commercially viable drug production in space is lowering. Varda is among the companies seeking to capitalize on the shift. The company launches its capsules into orbit aboard commercial rockets, such as SpaceX's Falcon 9. The capsules contain equipment for processing pharmaceuticals in orbit. After completing processing, the capsule separates from the orbital satellite, returns to Earth and is recovered for analysis. Other groups have shown that a small quantity of space-grown crystals can support multiple terrestrial production batches. In May, United Therapeutics partnered with Varda to develop improved formulations of treatments for rare lung indications. The pact supports the exploration of "how space-based manufacturing could contribute to significant improvements for rare pulmonary disease treatments," United Therapeutics CEO Martine Rothblatt said in a statement at the time. Varda and United Therapeutics have competition in the race to discover and make drugs in orbit. Space Microgravity Development (SpaceMD), part of the space and defense technology company Redwire, has given former Merck researcher Paul Reichert a strategic advisory role as it pursues orbital research and manufacturing. SpaceMD has signed a contract for a mission using Starfall, SpaceX's recently launched in-space manufacturing program. And Voyager Technologies operates research facilities aboard the International Space Station. The company's capacity, which supports a microgravity-enabled drug discovery pact with Space LiinTech, will be enhanced next year with a system for automated drug screening. Nick is a freelance writer who has been reporting on the global life sciences industry since 2008.

Varda Space Industries has launched two spacecraft on a single rocket for the first time, marking a shift to fleet operations. The company's W-8 and W-9 vehicles lifted off aboard SpaceX's Transporter-18 rideshare mission from Vandenberg Space Force Base. Both spacecraft carry payloads from government and commercial partners. W-8 hosts Canopy Aerospace & Defense's heat shield monitoring system and thermal protection materials funded by the Air Force Research Laboratory. W-9 carries a hypersonic navigation system and advanced heatshield materials from Syensqo. Varda has safely reentered six capsules since 2024. The dual launch demonstrates the company's increasing mission cadence as it scales orbital pharmaceutical processing and hypersonic reentry operations. The vehicles will be managed from Varda's expanded Mission Operations facility in El Segundo.