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ULA rocket set to launch Solar Orbiter as NASA, ESA near golden era of sun science
Just a year and a half after sending NASA’s Parker Solar Probe to study the Sun, United Launch Alliance (ULA) is ready to once again support a science mission on its way to the center of our solar system. The Solar Orbiter, a unique spacecraft jointly developed by NASA and the European Space Agency, will launch aboard a ULA Atlas V 411 booster, propelling it to the Sun to snap the first photos of its north and south poles.
The Solar Orbiter will work in conjunction with NASA’s Parker Solar Probe in unlocking the mysteries of our closest star. Parker Solar Probe occasionally dips into the Sun’s atmosphere – referred to as the corona – learning about the environment and the solar wind that propels energy and radiation into our solar system. The Solar Orbiter will – as the name suggests – orbit the Sun, but will remain further away than Parker (about 26 million miles away) allowing it to produce the first images of the Sun’s northern and southern poles. This advancement could potentially offer more insight into the Sun’s powerful magnetic field.
The ULA Atlas V 411 booster arrived in Florida back in November 2019. Since the completion of the previous Atlas V mission that supported the Boeing Starliner Orbital Flight Test in December 2019, ULA has been continuously prepping for the launch of the Solar Orbiter. In early January 2020, the booster was vertically hoisted into ULA’s Vertical Integration Facility. Following final booster preparations, including rolling it out to the launchpad for pre-launch testing twice, the safely encapsulated Solar Orbiter payload was carefully stacked on top during final integration on January 31st.
According to ULA, the Atlas V 411 configuration was selected to provide the necessary “Earth departure trajectory for making repeated close encounters with the sun.” The configuration used to launch the Solar Orbiter consists of a dual-nozzle main engine and one solid-fuel booster mounted to the side. This allows the rocket to utilize steering capability provided by the main engine while maintaining a center of gravity stabilized by the additional booster. ULA states that while this is a rather unique configuration, it is one that has been successfully utilized to support missions five times since 2006.
Ahead of the February 9th launch attempt, teams rolled the mighty Atlas V 411 out to the launchpad at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station to complete a full Wet Dress Rehearsal (WDR) – a full run-through of launch day operations including fueling the rocket and proceeding through terminal count. The first attempt at WDR resulted in a minor delay of launch due to a “wind-blown ECS cold air duct” that had to be replaced before testing could be completed, according to CEO of ULA, Tory Bruno. The second attempt of the WDR on January 24th was completed without a hitch.
On Friday morning February 7th, Bruno announced that all of pre-flight rehearsals and verifications were completed and the Solar Orbiter was ready to begin its journey to the Sun.
Currently, ULA and NASA are targeting a launch on Sunday, February 9th at 11:03 pm EST (0403 UTC) with a two-hour launch window. The launch weather is at 80% “GO” conditions with cumulus clouds as the primary concern for violation. Should the launch need to 24-hr recycle for a launch attempt on Monday, February 10th, weather conditions deteriorate slightly to 70% “GO.”
A live launch webcast will be provided on NASA TV beginning approximately 30 minutes prior to lift-off at 10:30 pm EST (0330 UTC).
Check out Teslarati’s newsletters for prompt updates, on-the-ground perspectives, and unique glimpses of SpaceX’s rocket launch and recovery processes.
Elon Musk
SpaceX just combined Grok, Cursor, and X into one mega plan
SpaceXSI merges Grok, Cursor, and X Premium into one plan, raising questions for Tesla owners.
SpaceX Super Intelligence has rolled out The X Subscription, a single plan that combines Grok, Grok Bot, Cursor, and X Premium.
There are five levels, including a free plan that includes daily Grok access and a starter allowance for Cursor’s coding agents. Plus is $8 per month, Premium is $30, Super is $100, and Ultra is $200. Usage scales as you move up, with Premium offering four times the Plus allowance, Super 15 times, and Ultra 50 times. Annual billing brings the prices down a bit further, with Premium at $300 per year.
We’ve unified plans across Grok, Cursor, and X Premium.
Introducing The X Subscription. https://t.co/SvkrVvBa0p
— SpaceX Super Intelligence (@SpaceXSI) October 12, 2026
The $30 Premium tier is where SpaceXSI says it packs the benefits of SuperGrok, Cursor Pro, and X Premium+, which previously added up to $90 per month. Grok Bot, the agent that handles tasks like ordering food or managing a calendar, is included from Premium upward but not on Plus. Paid plans share one weekly usage pool across Grok and Cursor, and each plan includes at least twice the coding usage of the comparable Cursor plan. Third party models in Cursor remain available on Premium and above, but they are billed separately at API list prices.
That last detail matters because of what has happened around Cursor this year. SpaceX exercised its option to buy the company for $60 billion in June, and the deal closed in August. Weeks later, OpenAI said it will cut Cursor’s access to its models on November 12. Bundling Cursor with Grok usage gives SpaceXSI a reason to steer developers toward its own models.
Tesla integrates Grok Bot into its vehicles for the ultimate personal assistant
For Tesla owners, the connection is Grok Bot. Tesla brought it into its vehicles last month, and at that point access inside the car was limited to SuperGrok Heavy subscribers. Grok Bot is now enabled across every Cybercab and the rest of the Model Y Robotaxi fleet. Neither SpaceXSI nor Tesla has said how the new plans change inside the car access for owners, or whether a $30 Premium subscription now covers Grok Bot in a personal Tesla. That is the question owners will want answered first.
The company is also changing its name along the way. The rollout follows the rebrand Musk announced on October 4, when he said SpaceXAI would become SpaceXSI, and the plan page now carries that branding.
The X Subscription is available to new customers starting now, and SpaceXSI says it will reach everyone globally over the next few days. Existing SuperGrok, Cursor, and X Premium subscribers do not have to switch. The option to move will appear gradually in billing settings, with a prorated refund for the unused time on the old plan. Switching is permanent once the accounts are unified, and old plans are closed to new sign ups.
Energy
Taiwan power firm bets big on Tesla Megapacks as AI data center thirst grows
Taiwan’s Apollo Power orders 260 Tesla Megapacks, betting AI data centers will need more electricity.
A Taiwanese power company has ordered 260 Tesla Megapack 2XL units, roughly 1GWh of storage, betting that electricity rather than chips will decide how fast AI data centers come online. Apollo Power signed the contract with Tesla’s Taiwan energy arm on October 8, according to the company’s filing with the Taiwan stock exchange.
The filing says the units are meant for behind the meter storage and resilient grid projects, with delivery in batches from the end of 2027 and sites operating in 2028. Apollo and Tesla did not disclose a price, citing a confidentiality agreement. Apollo plans to pay for the equipment through a cash capital increase and bank financing, and it noted the purchase is not revenue and does not mean it holds firm orders from its partners.
Biggo reported that only about 33 units are under signed customer contracts, with roughly 150 more in negotiation. The same report put total project investment near NT$130 billion, but that figure includes installation work, with the equipment itself making up about 40 to 50 percent. In other words, a large share of this order is Apollo reserving supply ahead of demand. Apollo’s chairman told local media global large storage supply is tight, which is why the company locked in the units early, according to Yahoo Taiwan Finance.
Apollo also launched an AI data center and grid resilience alliance with Phison, Gigabyte and Shihlin Electric. The pitch rests on a pilot at Phison’s Zhunan plant, where Apollo and Tesla Energy Taiwan installed grid forming Megapack 2XLs in June. Tesla Energy Taiwan general manager Sun Hsiao-Han said the project went from demo to 1GWh in four months, and that Tesla Energy has deployed more than 50GWh worldwide.
Taiwan’s cabinet has approved amendments that would require large energy users to install their own generation and storage, which gives enterprise storage a regulatory tailwind.
The deal fits a pattern Teslarati has tracked. Tesla’s Megablock targets 1GWh commissioned in 20 business days, a pitch aimed squarely at fast moving data center builds. Megapacks already back xAI’s Colossus in Memphis and a 400MW AI campus in Brazil. Sun Media adds that Megapack 2XL was named among the first products in Nvidia’s DSX Ready qualification for battery storage in AI factories.
Deliveries are more than a year away, so the real test is how much of that 260 unit order turns into signed customer contracts.
For a century, the car has asked the same thing of its owner, which is basically to pay attention. Even the best ride-hailing app like Uber or Lyft only moved the problem into someone else’s hands. You stopped driving, but you still sat in a stranger’s car, while half listening, and wondering whether to take a phone call in the car without being rude. The Cybercab has no wheel, no pedals and no driver. With Grok @bot now live inside it, it becomes something else entirely, and I think that matters more than the fleet count that everyone is tracking.
Grok @bot is an agent, not a voice assistant. A rider signs in once, and from then on can say what they need and watch it happen. Order dinner from a favorite restaurant. Fill the grocery cart. Move money, answer email, adjust a calendar, push a work project forward. Tesla engineer Yun-Ta Tsai confirmed it is enabled across every Cybercab and the rest of the Model Y fleet, and Tesla’s own pitch is that Full Self-Driving handles the commute while Grok handles the errands.
Think about what that does to a thirty minute ride. Uber sells you a trip, while Waymo sells you the same trip in a more private setting. Tesla is selling the thirty minutes themselves, returned to you with an assistant attached. Errands that used to eat a Saturday get done between pickup and drop off. The ride stops being dead time between two places and becomes a place of its own.
Tesla integrates Grok Bot into its vehicles for the ultimate personal assistant
Best of all, your Bots follow you into any Cybercab, and presumably your own Tesla, then logs you out automatically when you step out. Anyone can bolt a chatbot onto a screen, but much harder to own the vehicle, the autonomy stack and the assistant at once. It also quietly ties SpaceX’s Super Intelligence business to Tesla’s fleet, after Tesla converted its xAI stake into SpaceX equity. The relationship between those two companies is getting harder to describe as separate.
This is also where the hard questions start, because an agent that can spend your money in a vehicle other people also ride in needs some answers. How does it handle a voice it shouldn’t trust? What gets recorded, who can see it, and for how long? What happens when a rider leaves halfway through a task?
If Tesla gets those answers right, the scoreboard changes. We have been counting Cybercabs and wait times. The more telling number may be what riders accomplish per trip. That is data almost no one else will ever have, and it is the real reason to watch Grok @bot.
What do you think? Leave me a comment.
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