AN HISTORIC EVENT ANALYSIS OF THE EVOLVING HUMAN SUBORBITAL SPACE TRANSPORTATION INDUSTRY

摘要

The non-governmental, human suborbital space transportation industry (HSST1) began its evolution with the announcement of the Ansari X PRIZE in 1996, but revenue-generating operations, which could be evidence of industry viability, have not yet begun. An alternative form of evidence can be found using a framework based on population evolution research of organization theory. Necessary (but not sufficient) industry infrastructure elements (IIEs) have been identified in previous research. IIEs are market structures that must exist for long-term industry viability. The major HE categories include proprietary functions, resource endowments, and institutional arrangements. Each of these are subsequently broken down into second and third-level subordinate elements. From the outset of market formation, industry and government actors benefit by working together to develop the IIEs. This paper describes the results of an historical event analysis (HEA) that identifies how population members of the HSSTI have contributed to the construction of the necessary IIEs. Identification of incidents and events that contribute to HE development by actors in both the public and private sectors can highlight the presence of existing market formation structures. Additionally, the lack of such structures may indicate the presence of market formation barriers. Understanding the status of the different IIEs can also identify strategic opportunities for meaningful market formation contributions by the different actors. HSSTI HEA data was collected from multiple secondary sources, including archive documents, press releases, publicly available government documents, conference presentations, news media reports, editorials and commentaries. The level of analysis for the HEA is the population (aka "industry") level. The fundamental datum of this analysis is the individual event, defined as "an incident when change occurred" in each of the IIEs. This study found that all three HE categories have been significantly, but not entirely, developed to date. Private actors contribute in a meaningful way to many sub-elements in each of the three major HE categories. Contributions on the part of public actors is substantial in all IIEs with the exception of the proprietary functions category.