His first tweet on it was
Well, at least the pieces were bigger this time! Won't be last RUD, but am optimistic about upcoming ship landing. pic.twitter.com/w007TccANJ
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 17, 2016
Then followed a video of the explosion on Instagram. Then his final post
My best guess for 2016: ~70% landing success rate (so still a few more RUDs to go), then hopefully improving to ~90% in 2017
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 19, 2016
Well what can we learn from all these seemingly epic failures? 1.Business Model Innovation The default for the rockets launched is to blow up. i.e. If Elon wasn't trying to figure how to land one it wouldn't raise eyebrows. SpaceX business model is designed such that the rockets get to bring in revenue regardless of the outcome. The latest one hadd already done its job of delivering an ocean monitoring satellite in orbit, which had already paid for the rocket. Companies and governments pay Elon beforehand to send their cargos to space. With revenue secure, more focus is then put on how to test new innovations (like landing the rockets back safely). In this era if you can get to do product development and testing DURING delivery rather BEFORE it then your business model is a winner. 2.Testing and Iteration Testing and iteration is best done infront of your customers. When you are serving them that's how you best understand their needs. Elon Musk tests his products when delivering an existing product to develop the next product. In the old paradigm, it was easy to dismiss testing as being too costly. In the new paradigm, it’s NOT testing that’s far more expensive. You don’t need to be a billionaire like Elon to test like him. But you do need to test like Elon to be a billionaire like him. Failing isn’t where the price is. Failing is where the profit is. Note: “RUD” stands for “Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly”]]>