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SpaceX competitor ULA CEO still questions the economic value of reusable rockets
SpaceX has made a name for itself for being one of the only private space companies today to deploy a fleet of rockets that are capable of being reused for multiple missions. Elon Musk has sworn by the economics of rocket reusability, and this is shown by SpaceX’s launch prices compared to competitors that use expendable rockets. Yet for Tory Bruno, the CEO of ULA, the economic sense behind reusable rockets like the Falcon 9 is still questionable.
Interestingly enough, the ULA is poised to use Blue Origin’s BE-4 engines for the first stage of its expendable Vulcan rocket. Like SpaceX, Blue Origin’s vision of spaceflight involves rockets that can be reused multiple times before they are retired. ULA, for its part, notes that it may decide to recover and reuse the Vulcan’s BE-4 engines down the road, using a system that disengages the units after launch and having them fall back through the atmosphere while being protected by an inflatable hypersonic shield.
A helicopter would then be positioned to catch the engine section midair while it makes its descent. ULA has come up with a noteworthy name for this system: the Sensible Modular Autonomous Return Technology, or SMART approach. In a statement to Aviation Week, ULA CEO Tory Bruno explained the strategy behind the company’s SMART strategy.
“It does not impact, in any significant way, the overall performance of the launch vehicle because you don’t have to save fuel to fly home with. You still get to burn up all your fuel, separate your engine, which is the most expensive piece, and recover it,” Bruno said.
Elaborating further, the ULA CEO mentioned that ultimately, he believes that the economics of reusable rockets is still up for question. Bruno argued that it is still difficult to ensure that using reusable rockets instead of expendable machines actually saves money.
“We have not really changed our assessment over the last couple of years because we have yet to see the other forms of reusability—flyback or propulsive return to Earth—demonstrate economic sustainability on a recurring basis. It’s pretty darn hard to make that actually save money… We’ve seen nothing yet that changes our analysis on that,” the ULA CEO said.
The ULA CEO’s points about the possible lack of savings on reusable rockets put him in stark contrast with other noteworthy leaders in the space industry. Apart from SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos of Blue Origin is also intently focused on using reusable rockets. Even Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck, whose company designs and launches small rockets, has embraced the idea of reusing previously-flown boosters.
In a statement in August 2019, for example, Beck noted that he actually had to “eat his hat” when it came to reusing his company’s rockets. “For a long time, I said we weren’t going to do reusability. This is one of those occasions where I have to eat my hat,” the Rocket Lab CEO said.
That being said, the fact that the ULA CEO is considering reusing the Vulcan’s BE-4 engines may be considered as a small win for reusable rockets. Perhaps in the near future, Bruno would see exactly why SpaceX has grown so much over the years, and why the company is practically launching its Starlink satellite internet system at a minimal cost.
“We view (rocket reuse) as sort of a journey. We’re going to start with the engines because we’re pretty sure we can save money with that and pass those savings on right away. As we learn more by doing, we’ll continue to assess other valuable parts of the rocket, and we may discover that we can do that there as well.
“There is one funny thing about reusability. As you make your rocket less expensive, and you make parts of your rocket less expensive, it’s harder to close a business case on reuse because the thing you’re recovering isn’t as valuable. There’s a balance there,” Bruno said.
Tesla short sellers won big following the company’s massive fall on Wall Street after it reported subpar Earnings on Wednesday.
Tesla short sellers collected about $4.12 billion in single-day profits on Thursday, according to Bloomberg. Shares fell as much as 15 percent during Thursday’s session. It closed as one of the worst days for Tesla on Wall Street in the past three years.
Investors sold off the stock after Tesla said it would aggressively direct its spending toward AI and its Optimus robot project. The company had record revenues, which were driven by one of the strongest quarters in terms of vehicle deliveries in company history.
However, it missed EPS estimates by reporting just $0.33, a far cry from the $0.53 analysts expected.
S3 Partners reported that about 3 percent of Tesla’s outstanding stock is sold short. Managing Director at S3, Ihor Dusaniwsky, provided the short seller’s potential profit, as well as another figure: shorts have likely had paper gains of $8.92 billion this year, as Tesla shares are down 30 percent in 2026.
Tesla (TSLA) Q2 2026 earnings results: miss on EPS, beat on revenue
Tesla has burned short sellers many times in the past, but the company’s latest Earnings Call was a chance for those skeptics to taste some payback. Although the company gave some very transparent information regarding future projects, the rollout of Robotaxi, Optimus, and Semi, many investors took their profits on Thursday.
Notable short sellers like Michael Burry have been transparent about their skepticism around Tesla shares. Burry just revealed three weeks ago that he had opened up a new short on the stock, stating he shorted Tesla shares at $416.22. “Happy it jumped back to this level,” he said in a blog post.
At the time of publication, Tesla shares were down about 3 percent and the stock was trading at $309.92.
Tesla’s long-standing saga regarding its door handles and a manual release has entered its latest chapter, and as a result, a big change is coming.
On Friday, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) denied Tesla’s petition that was seeking a defect investigation into roughly 180,000 Model 3 vehicles for an issue involving the emergency mechanical door release.
🚨 The NHTSA denied a petition from Tesla that would have thrown out concerns regarding its door handles.
NHTSA said Tesla’s petition did not present evidence of a safety-related defect warranting an investigation. The agency said a rulemaking process would be a better strategy. pic.twitter.com/j6PzUBM1mT
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 24, 2026
NHTSA said that Tesla’s petition did not present evidence of a safety-related defect in the door handles or their emergency releases. Instead, the agency determined that it would rather solve the issue of the lack of labeling or location of emergency mechanical door releases and the federal safety rules that govern them.
Essentially, the NHTSA wants to create and enforce rules that would require automakers to make emergency door latch releases more clearly labeled in a car. Despite a Tesla having manual door releases on all four passenger doors, many people do not know they exist or how they work.
Tesla addresses door handle complaints with simple engineering fix
In recent times, Tesla has faced some criticism involving its door handles, specifically because some occupants have reported that they are unable to exit their vehicles after losing power. The door handles on a Tesla are electronically operated, but in the event that the 12V battery dies, there is a manual release that can be used.
The NHTSA only identified a single complaint involving the mechanical door releases: a 2022 Model 3 owner said the release was concealed and unlabeled after the vehicle lost power after a front-end collision. It has also already started to create a separate rulemaking process to make emergency door-egress systems more obvious.
It should be noted that all Teslas have mechanical emergency door releases, but they are placed in various locations as the vehicles have aged and been redesigned from year to year. Refer to the safety manual for your vehicle if you have any confusion about where the emergency releases are and how they work.
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SpaceX Starship Flight 13 faces wrath of the Texas skies
SpaceX pushed Starship Flight 13 to Friday, blaming weather instead of the previous engine issues.
SpaceX called off Thursday’s launch attempt of Starship Flight 13, pushing the mission to Friday because of weather tied to Tropical Storm Bertha. The company confirmed the delay on X, noting “Now targeting Friday, July 24 for Starship’s thirteenth flight test, due to weather. A key objective for the flight test is to get clear imagery from the ground of Starship’s heatshield as it flies at a higher dynamic pressure during ascent, which won’t be possible with today’s weather conditions.”
This is the second delay for Flight 13 in two weeks. SpaceX first tried to launch the mission on July 16, but the countdown ended in an automated abort at T-0 when four of Super Heavy Booster 20’s 33 Raptor engines failed to ignite. Musk said at the time that two Raptors would need to be removed and replaced, as Teslarati reported. The company spent the following week destacking Ship 40 and Booster 20, swapping engines, and running leak checks before restacking the vehicle on Pad 2 Wednesday night, according to Spaceflight Now’s live coverage.
Unlike the engine problem, Thursday’s delay has nothing to do with the hardware. SpaceX wants clean footage of Starship’s heat shield captured from the ground as the vehicle flies through max dynamic pressure, something the storm’s cloud cover over South Texas would not allow. The company said visibility should improve for Friday’s attempt, with the same 90 minute window opening at 5:45 p.m. CT.
Flight 13 will be the second outing for the V3 versions of Starship and Super Heavy, following their debut on Flight 12 in May. The mission carries 20 production Starlink V3 satellites, the first time SpaceX has flown operational satellites rather than mass simulators on Starship. Six of those satellites are fitted with cameras to inspect the heat shield from a different angle during ascent, giving engineers a second data source beyond the ground imagery the weather is currently blocking.
Booster 20 will attempt a boostback burn and a splashdown landing burn in the Gulf of America, while Ship 40 follows a suborbital trajectory toward a landing in the Indian Ocean. The flight plan largely mirrors Flight 12, though the booster will run a more aggressive ascent burn after max Q this time, and the ship’s heat shield includes load sensing tiles meant to measure stress at the higher dynamic pressure SpaceX is targeting.
If Friday’s attempt succeeds, Flight 13 could be the last suborbital test in the program. SpaceX is already looking to push for an orbital flight on Flight 14.
Tesla short sellers win big after shares fall after earnings
Tesla door handle saga gets its latest chapter and a big change is coming
