Latest / Chief in Tech Deep Dive Shortcast / Chief in Tech S1E25 - Shelli Brunswick : Space – Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Leadership

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Chief in Tech S1E25 - Shelli Brunswick : Space – Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Leadership · Chief in Tech Deep Dive Shortcast

• 0:00
  I want you to take a second and just look down
• 0:03
  at your smartphone. Or if your phone happens
• 0:05
  to be in your pocket, just look down at the athletic
• 0:08
  shoes on your feet. Yeah, that's a perfect place
• 0:10
  to start. Right. Because you probably don't realize
• 0:12
  this, but you are currently holding or wearing
• 0:16
  literal space technology. Exactly. We have this
• 0:19
  incredibly rigid mental image of what the space
• 0:23
  industry actually is. We picture a launch pad,
• 0:27
  a massive rocket, billionaires in heavy suits,
• 0:31
  mission control rooms. Right, the whole Hollywood
• 0:33
  aesthetic. Exactly. But today, we're doing a
• 0:36
  deep dive into some data from the Space Foundation,
• 0:39
  specifically this incredible presentation by
• 0:41
  their chief operating officer, Shelley Brunswick,
• 0:44
  at the Women Tech Network. And it basically proves
• 0:47
  that you are already standing right in the middle
• 0:49
  of a global space economy. You really are. And
• 0:51
  the crazy part. This industry is practically
• 0:54
  begging you to take a piece of it regardless
• 0:56
  of your background or you know what you went
• 0:58
  to school for Okay, let's unpack this because
• 1:01
  the numbers we are looking at are frankly staggering
• 1:04
  They really are and what's fascinating here is
• 1:07
  the massive almost comical disconnect between
• 1:10
  public perception and economic reality. Oh totally
• 1:13
  When you look at the current state of the global
• 1:15
  space economy, it's valued at four hundred and
• 1:18
  twenty four billion dollars. It's just huge.
• 1:22
  Right. That is not some niche scientific endeavor.
• 1:25
  You know, it is a massive economic engine and
• 1:28
  it's an engine that is fundamentally changing
• 1:29
  how human beings live. And it's not stopping
• 1:31
  at four hundred and twenty four billion either
• 1:33
  because the financial projections specifically
• 1:35
  citing Bank of America in this research, they
• 1:38
  estimate this economy is going to styrocket to
• 1:40
  one point four trillion by the year 2030. Which
• 1:43
  is just around the corner, really. Exactly. And
• 1:45
  by 2040, over three trillion. Trillion with a
• 1:49
  T. Yeah. And to understand how an industry scales
• 1:52
  to three trillion, you have to look at who is
• 1:53
  actually participating. Right. More than 80 nations
• 1:56
  actively operate in space, but literally almost
• 1:59
  every nation, every individual, and every company
• 2:02
  on Earth uses it. Everyone is plugged in. Exactly.
• 2:05
  The nature of the game has fundamentally changed.
• 2:08
  If we look at the historical shift, you know,
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  40 years ago, space was essentially just two
• 2:13
  competing governments during the Cold War. Just
• 2:15
  this massive geopolitical chess match. Right.
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  It was heavily militarized, highly secretive
• 2:21
  and very male dominated. But today, the pendulum
• 2:25
  has completely swung in the opposite direction.
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  We're looking at an inclusive ecosystem that
• 2:30
  spans across 16 different sectors. So we're talking
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  data analytics, energy storage, healthcare, advanced
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  manufacturing, artificial intelligence, and virtual
• 2:41
  reality. And here is the statistic that forced
• 2:44
  me to just completely re -evaluate everything.
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  In the United States... 80 % of the space economy
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  is commercial. That's the key right there. It
• 2:52
  is. Because when we hear space economy, we view
• 2:54
  it like an exclusive VIP club, where only Elon
• 2:57
  Musk, Jeff Bezos, and NASA astronauts are on
• 2:59
  the guest list. Yeah, that's a perception. But
• 3:01
  looking at these numbers, it's actually more
• 3:03
  like the internet itself. It's this massive underlying
• 3:05
  infrastructure that powers everything else, from
• 3:08
  agriculture to finance. But on. It's driven by
• 3:11
  everyday jobs, consumer products, services, entrepreneurship.
• 3:15
  And the financial incentives for the everyday
• 3:16
  worker completely back that up. I mean, average
• 3:19
  salaries in the space industry consistently outpace
• 3:22
  comparative sectors. But the real realization
• 3:25
  comes when you look at the tangible outputs.
• 3:28
  If 80 % of this massive economy is commercial,
• 3:32
  they are selling the everyday items we just take
• 3:34
  for granted. Which brings us right back to your
• 3:37
  smartphone and your running shoes. because the
• 3:39
  presentation revealed that a standard cell phone
• 3:41
  alone contains three different types of space
• 3:44
  technology. It does. But I want to pause here
• 3:46
  because it's easy to just list things off. Like,
• 3:48
  how does a cell phone actually connect to a satellite
• 3:51
  or a space probe? So it really comes down to
• 3:55
  the brutal constraints of space travel. In the
• 3:57
  1990s, NASA realized that interplanetary spacecraft
• 4:01
  needed to be much, much smaller. Just to save
• 4:03
  on fuel and launch costs, right? Exactly. But
• 4:06
  they still needed to take high quality photographs
• 4:08
  of other planets. And the existing cameras at
• 4:10
  the time were far too large and required way
• 4:13
  too much power. OK, so what did they do? Well,
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  a team at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory invented
• 4:18
  the CMOS active pixel sensor. They essentially
• 4:22
  miniaturized a camera onto a tiny microchip.
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  Wow. And that exact technology engineered to
• 4:29
  photograph Mars and Jupiter is the camera lens
• 4:31
  sitting on the back of the smartphone in your
• 4:33
  hand right now. So every time I take a photo,
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  I'm literally using interplanetary probe technology.
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  You are. That is wild. And it's not just the
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  camera, right? It's the GPS navigation that tells
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  me where I'm driving. Yep, which relies on atomic
• 4:47
  clocks developed for satellites. And even the
• 4:49
  scratch -resistant glass on the screen traces
• 4:52
  back to the durable coating they had to invent
• 4:55
  for astronaut helmet visors. Right, so they wouldn't
• 4:57
  get scratched by space dust. It's the ultimate
• 4:59
  proving ground. When you engineer a solution
• 5:02
  for a zero -gravity environment with extreme
• 5:04
  temperature fluctuations and massive radiation,
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  you inevitably create a highly durable, highly
• 5:10
  efficient technology. I have to call a timeout
• 5:12
  here, though, and play devil's advocate. Go for
• 5:14
  it. Because when I'm watching a mattress commercial
• 5:17
  and they start talking about space age memory
• 5:19
  foam, I immediately assume that is 100 % a marketing
• 5:23
  gimmick. I think most people do. Right. Are you
• 5:26
  telling me NASA actually designed my bed? This
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  raises an important question about what technology
• 5:30
  transfer actually is. Because it sounds like
• 5:33
  a gimmick, but it is literal aerospace engineering.
• 5:36
  Seriously? Yeah. Think about the g -force an
• 5:39
  astronaut takes during the launch and reentry
• 5:42
  of a spacecraft. It's immense. In the 1960s,
• 5:45
  during the Apollo era, NASA had to invent a material
• 5:48
  for the seats that would mold to a human body
• 5:51
  to absorb that incredible shock. But then it
• 5:54
  had to return to its original shape so it could
• 5:56
  be reused for different astronauts. Oh, wow.
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  So they created temper foam. And decades later,
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  that highly specific crash protection material
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  is exactly what we sleep on and what lines the
• 6:07
  soles of our athletic shoes to abhor the impact
• 6:10
  of running. That's incredible. And it's not just
• 6:12
  consumer comfort either. The sources dive heavily
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  into life -saving medical advancements. Yeah,
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  this is where it gets really profound. things
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  like mammogram detection and MRIs. And I struggled
• 6:23
  to see the connection there at first. Like, how
• 6:25
  does launching a rocket relate to scanning a
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  human body? It connects through the imaging algorithms.
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  So when the Hubble Space Telescope was first
• 6:34
  launched, it actually had a flaw in its mirror.
• 6:37
  Oh, right. I remember hearing about that. Yeah.
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  And the images of distant galaxies were coming
• 6:41
  back super blurry. So the software engineers
• 6:44
  at NASA had to write highly advanced digital
• 6:47
  imaging algorithms to isolate the stars and clarify
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  those blurry pictures. Well, medical researchers
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  realized that if this software could spot a faint,
• 6:56
  blurry star against the blackness of space, it
• 6:59
  could probably also spot faint microscopic anomalies
• 7:02
  in human tissue. No way. Yes. That space software
• 7:05
  was adapted to spot microcalcifications in breast
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  tissue. which led to non -surgical biopsies and
• 7:11
  vastly improved mammogram detection. It's taking
• 7:14
  the absolute extreme of human engineering and
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  applying it to our daily survival. And that extends
• 7:19
  to the broader environment too. The presentation
• 7:22
  highlighted Earth observation satellites. We
• 7:25
  tend to think of satellites as just broadcasting
• 7:27
  television or internet. Right, the basic stuff.
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  But they're essentially the nervous system of
• 7:32
  the global economy. They don't just sit up there.
• 7:35
  They power the precise weather predictions that
• 7:37
  allow commercial flights to navigate safely.
• 7:40
  They track global water resources so we know
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  where drought is hitting. They even optimize
• 7:45
  agriculture by telling farmers exactly which
• 7:48
  crops are yielding and which need more water,
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  down to the square meter. We don't feel our nerves
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  firing to regulate our body temperature, and
• 7:56
  we don't see those satellites regulating global
• 7:58
  shipping routes in agriculture. But if you sever
• 8:01
  that nerve, the whole modern world just shuts
• 8:04
  down. Here's where it gets really interesting.
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  Because you would think that venture capitalists
• 8:09
  and massive corporations have already mined all
• 8:11
  of this tech. You'd think the gold rush is completely
• 8:14
  over. You'd think so, yeah. But the data highlights
• 8:17
  what the Space Foundation calls the innovation
• 8:19
  gap. Right now, at the NASA Technology Transfer
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  Office and the European Space Agency, there are
• 8:27
  thousands of patents just sitting there. Thousands
• 8:29
  of them. They relate to transportation, healthcare,
• 8:33
  pharmaceuticals, energy storage. They are literally
• 8:35
  sitting in a vault waiting for everyday entrepreneurs
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  to commercialize them. It is a massive, uncapped
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  reservoir of intellectual property. The research
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  has already been funded by taxpayers. The engineering
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  has already been done by some of the brightest
• 8:49
  minds on the planet. It's just wild. And the
• 8:52
  literal process of accessing this isn't some
• 8:54
  secretive closed -door affair. Anyone can go
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  online to the NASA Tech Transfer website, browse
• 9:00
  through categories like robotics or advanced
• 9:02
  materials, and apply for a commercial license.
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  Just like that. They are literally waiting for
• 9:07
  business minded individuals to figure out how
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  to package these extreme environment solutions
• 9:12
  for the everyday consumer market. But OK, if
• 9:15
  it is this lucrative and there is a clear mathematical
• 9:18
  path to a three trillion dollar economy with
• 9:21
  thousands of cutting edge patents just waiting
• 9:24
  to be claimed. Why isn't every small business
• 9:27
  in the world pivoting to space commerce? There
• 9:29
  has to be a catch. Well, the industry is hitting
• 9:31
  a massive wall. There are three distinct roadblocks
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  preventing this explosive growth from happening
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  smoothly. OK, what are they? A severe workforce
• 9:39
  shortage, a widening skills deficit, and that
• 9:42
  innovation gap we just outlined. Right. So the
• 9:45
  workforce shortage seems to be a purely demographic
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  issue across the US, the European Union, Japan
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  and other major economies. The workforce is simply
• 9:53
  aging out. Yeah, it's a huge. The baby boomers
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  who built the foundational infrastructure of
• 9:58
  this industry in academia, private manufacturing,
• 10:01
  government agencies, they are all retiring. And
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  the critical issue is that there simply aren't
• 10:06
  enough younger workers coming in behind them
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  to fill those empty seats. Which crashes directly
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  into the second roadblock, the skills deficit.
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  The presentation provided a really illuminating
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  example from the height of the COVID pandemic
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  in 2020. Oh yeah, the tourism example. Exactly.
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  The space industry had plenty of open jobs available
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  at the time. While concurrently, millions of
• 10:26
  people were displaced from the travel and tourism
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  industries. You would think that's a perfect
• 10:30
  match. Right. But they couldn't just plug those
• 10:33
  unemployed people into the open space jobs because
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  the displaced workers lack the specific modern
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  skills required. It really highlights this intense
• 10:43
  need for constant re -skilling and up -skilling.
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  The speaker made a very relatable point about
• 10:48
  how everyone today has to learn new software
• 10:51
  constantly just to function. Oh, absolutely.
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  She referenced the very real struggle of having
• 10:55
  to suddenly learn how to use HubSpot or new video
• 10:58
  conferencing tools just to join a meeting. Technology
• 11:01
  is moving so fast that the traditional workforce
• 11:04
  is struggling to keep up with the baseline requirements.
• 11:07
  If we connect this to the bigger picture... It
• 11:09
  becomes clear that this isn't just an engineering
• 11:11
  problem. It is a fundamental labor crisis. Wow.
• 11:15
  And to solve it, the space industry has to completely
• 11:17
  abandon its traditional talent pools. The industry
• 11:21
  is absolutely desperate for non -STEM professionals.
• 11:24
  This part completely blew my mind. Because we
• 11:27
  think of space as purely scientists, physicists,
• 11:30
  mathematicians. Which we do. But the industry
• 11:33
  specifically needs welders. They need electricians.
• 11:36
  They need trades workers for the massive manufacturing
• 11:39
  sector required to build these components. Think
• 11:42
  about what a welder does in the space industry,
• 11:45
  right? They aren't just joining two pieces of
• 11:47
  metal. They're fusing alloys that have to withstand
• 11:50
  the vacuum of space, micrometeorite impacts,
• 11:54
  and thousands of degrees of heat during rocket
• 11:56
  propulsion. That is intense. It is high end,
• 11:59
  extreme environment manufacturing that requires
• 12:01
  master craftsmen, not just PhD students. They
• 12:04
  also desperately need business administrators
• 12:07
  to actually run these new startups and program
• 12:09
  managers to keep complex multi -year missions
• 12:11
  on track and under budget. Exactly. The presentation
• 12:14
  even explicitly stated they need artists like
• 12:17
  musicians, filmmakers and TV creators. Which
• 12:20
  sounds surprising at first. It does. Why artists?
• 12:23
  Because someone has to visualize these habitats.
• 12:25
  Someone has to tell the story. of this new frontier
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  to inspire the next generation to actually want
• 12:30
  to work in it. And because of this sheer desperation
• 12:33
  for talent across every conceivable discipline,
• 12:37
  the old barriers to entry have been completely
• 12:39
  erased. That's the silver lining here. The space
• 12:42
  industry is now open to groups that were historically
• 12:45
  shut out. It goes far beyond vital initiatives
• 12:48
  for women and minorities. It explicitly targets
• 12:51
  underrepresented geographies. Like where? Inner
• 12:55
  cities, rural farming communities, different
• 12:57
  regions across the entire globe. The industry
• 13:00
  can no longer afford to be an exclusive club.
• 13:02
  So if I'm a displaced tourism worker or an artist
• 13:05
  or a welder listening to this and I hear there
• 13:07
  are thousands of NASA patents sitting around
• 13:10
  and an industry desperate for my help, my immediate
• 13:13
  thought is, great, let me add them. Right. But
• 13:15
  I can't just walk into the European Space Agency
• 13:17
  and demand a job. What is the actual bridge between
• 13:21
  me and this ecosystem? This is exactly what the
• 13:24
  Space Foundation Center for Innovation and Education
• 13:26
  was built to solve. They developed a highly structured
• 13:29
  five -step workforce development roadmap. And
• 13:32
  those five steps are awareness, access, training,
• 13:36
  connecting, and mentoring. That makes sense.
• 13:37
  Every single program they run operates on this
• 13:40
  pathway to take someone from zero aerospace knowledge
• 13:43
  to active participant. Step one is awareness,
• 13:46
  which is the foundational realization that this
• 13:48
  ecosystem even exists, that it's 80 % commercial
• 13:51
  and that there is a place for your specific skill
• 13:55
  set in it. Step two is access. You know, you
• 13:58
  need a doorway in. The presentation highlights
• 14:01
  several specific access points, like participating
• 14:04
  in the Women Tech Network, engaging with the
• 14:07
  UN Office of Outer Space Affairs, Space for Women
• 14:10
  program, or joining the Space Generation Advisory
• 14:12
  Council. It's about finding the open door that
• 14:15
  aligns with your background. Exactly. From there,
• 14:17
  you move to training. And this isn't necessarily
• 14:20
  a four -year degree, right? Not at all. It could
• 14:21
  mean getting a specific manufacturing certification
• 14:24
  or taking a targeted online course to upskill
• 14:27
  your software knowledge. Then you move to connecting
• 14:29
  with the industry by attending events. And finally,
• 14:33
  mentoring. Finding someone who has already navigated
• 14:36
  this complicated path to help you overcome the
• 14:39
  inevitable roadblocks. And to execute this roadmap,
• 14:42
  they have built incredibly robust practical programs.
• 14:45
  For adults and small businesses looking to transition
• 14:47
  into the industry, they offer the Space Commerce
• 14:51
  Entrepreneurship Program. What does that entail?
• 14:53
  This includes online webinars, virtual and in
• 14:56
  -person workshops, and entrepreneurial podcast
• 14:59
  series to highlight role models. They've already
• 15:02
  successfully helped hundreds of entrepreneurs
• 15:04
  figure out the literal mechanics of licensing
• 15:07
  a patent and building a business model around
• 15:09
  it. But the initiative that really stopped me
• 15:11
  in my tracks was the Junior Space Entrepreneurship
• 15:14
  Program. Oh, it's brilliant. This is aimed at
• 15:16
  K -12 students primarily high schoolers, and
• 15:19
  they aren't just teaching them to memorize the
• 15:21
  names of the planets or build baking soda volcanoes,
• 15:23
  which is what my space education looked like.
• 15:26
  Right, mine too. They put these students into
• 15:28
  teams, and the team's initial mission is to theoretically
• 15:31
  go to Mars and safely return. So they have to
• 15:34
  learn the STEM skills, the math, the biology
• 15:36
  required to survive that journey. But the brilliant
• 15:39
  twist is that once they return to Earth, the
• 15:42
  mission isn't over. They then have to form a
• 15:45
  company and commercialize a product or technology
• 15:48
  they developed during their journey to Mars.
• 15:50
  It is an incredibly sophisticated approach to
• 15:53
  education. By forcing them to commercialize the
• 15:56
  technology, they are learning critical 21st century
• 15:59
  skills. Yes. Whether they eventually become space
• 16:02
  entrepreneurs or go work in a completely different
• 16:04
  sector like finance or health care, they are
• 16:07
  learning project management, marketing, financial
• 16:10
  modeling, team collaboration, all under the exciting
• 16:13
  umbrella of a Mars mission. And for the professionals
• 16:16
  already working or trying to transition in, they
• 16:18
  host massive networking events. The annual Space
• 16:21
  Symposium in Colorado Springs brings in tens
• 16:24
  of thousands of attendees. It's huge. And recognizing
• 16:26
  that networking can't just happen once a year,
• 16:29
  they launched Symposium 365, a digital program
• 16:32
  to keep the global space community actively collaborating
• 16:35
  year round. It all comes back to that collaboration.
• 16:39
  Whether you are dealing with military, commercial,
• 16:41
  civil or international sectors, the technological
• 16:45
  multiplies when the community is connected rather
• 16:47
  than siloed. So if you are driving in your car
• 16:51
  right now or at the gym and you have absolutely
• 16:54
  zero background in aerospace. Yeah. What is literally
• 16:57
  step one for you today? Step one is moving from
• 17:00
  that awareness phase into the access phase. You
• 17:03
  go to SpaceFoundation .org. You look at their
• 17:06
  specific resources. You browse that NASA patent
• 17:08
  database online to see what kind of technology
• 17:10
  actually exists. To see what's out there. Exactly.
• 17:13
  And most importantly, you seek out a mentor through
• 17:16
  organizations like the Women Tech Network or
• 17:18
  the UN Space for Women program, which by the
• 17:20
  way are open to both men and women. You simply
• 17:23
  have to decide to step through the door. So what
• 17:25
  does this all mean? We started this deep dive
• 17:26
  looking at a hidden $424 billion economy. And
• 17:31
  we've traced it all the way down to the realization
• 17:33
  that your unique skills, whether you are working
• 17:36
  in business administration, whether you are a
• 17:38
  creative artist, or whether you work in a completely
• 17:40
  unrelated trade, are desperately needed to help
• 17:43
  push this industry toward that $3 trillion mark.
• 17:47
  They really are. The ultimate takeaway here is
• 17:50
  that space exploration is no longer just about
• 17:52
  looking up at the stars. It is fundamentally
• 17:54
  about bettering life down here on Earth. It's
• 17:57
  about jobs. It's about medical breakthroughs.
• 18:00
  And it's about everyday innovation. And that
• 18:02
  leaves us with a fascinating implication to consider.
• 18:04
  If high schoolers in the Junior Space Entrepreneurship
• 18:08
  Program are learning to build real -world businesses
• 18:10
  by commercializing the technology needed to survive
• 18:13
  on Mars, well, what if the next massive world
• 18:16
  -changing industry on Earth isn't invented to
• 18:19
  solve an Earth problem at all? What if the cure
• 18:21
  to our most pressing terrestrial challenges,
• 18:24
  whether that's in agriculture, water management,
• 18:26
  or healthcare, is accidentally born from simply
• 18:30
  trying to keep human beings alive on another
• 18:32
  planet. How does that change the way we view
• 18:35
  the absolute necessity of space exploration?
• 18:38
  That is an incredible thought to leave on. Thank
• 18:40
  you so much for joining us on this journey today.
• 18:42
  Keep looking closely at the technology around
• 18:44
  you. Keep questioning the boundaries of your
• 18:46
  own industry. And as always, keep learning.