SpaceX to launch astronauts for first time

Yahoo Finance's Brian Sozzi, Alexis Christoforous, Heidi Chung, and Ines Ferre discuss SpaceX and NASA's preparation for the launch of SpaceX Crew Dragon.

Video Transcript

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOUROS: SpaceX is set to make some history today. It's launching the company's first ever crewed space flight from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Yahoo Finance's Ines Ferre is here to break it all down. Ines, I know you're a big space fan.

INES FERRE: I am, Brian. And this is just so exciting because this is exciting for the US. It's the first launch of astronauts to the ISS from US soil in nine years. The US doesn't now have to keep paying Russians to send astronauts on Russia's capsule. And this is also so exciting for SpaceX because it's a huge endeavor for them to be able to use a Crew Dragon capsule to take astronauts to the ISS.

It's also just gives you kind of a glimpse of the appetite really from people for this kind of space exploration and going-- and in the future, investor appetite for space-- human spaceflights.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOUROS: Hey, Ines, SpaceX signed a $2.6 billion contract with NASA to complete six missions. At the same time, NASA also inked a similar deal with Boeing for $4.2 billion. So what does today's launch-- hopefully it does happen. I know the weather is a little iffy. But what does today's launch mean for the two companies in the space race?

INES FERRE: Well, it's interesting because for Boeing this ups the ante for them, for sure because they had their Starliner which didn't go into the correct orbit back in December. So it wasn't able to dock to the ISS. Boeing has to retest its Starliner before it can put humans on it.

So SpaceX has reached first. And definitely watchers of all this also look at the fact that NASA paid Boeing about $2 billion more to essentially do the same thing as SpaceX. And SpaceX got here quicker.

Of course, the future endeavors are for it to go to the moon, to then go to Mars. But this also kind of gives you an idea of the marriage between government and the private space industry. So this is one of those big first steps. NASA contracted these companies to do this. And as we go forward into more space missions, into more explorations, you can expect to see this sort of marriage between the two.

And also, it's worthy to note that during a downturn too, governments spend on space exploration. So it can certainly help companies.

HEIDI CHUNG: Ines, it's Heidi. Just a quick question. So from what I understand, there's a possibility that this mission could potentially not happen today. What is that contingent upon? And if it doesn't happen, is there another date that it could potentially occur?

INES FERRE: Yeah, there are some backup dates, May 30, May 31. The mission is supposed to happen at 4:33 PM today. It's, of course, weather-permitting. We've seen these kinds of missions in the past be postponed a lot of times. I mean, this is-- so much of this is weather-contingent. And of course, there's a lot of calculations that go into these launches.

So if it doesn't happen today-- and it's not looking too great. But we'll see what-- we still have several hours to go. If it doesn't happen today, then you can expect to see it on May 30 or May 31, at the end of May.

BRIAN SOZZI: Ines, how is this big-- how isn't Elong Musk distracted by all this. How does one person pull all these innovations off at once?

INES FERRE: Well, speaking to some of the alumni from Penn, he had a double major at Penn, by the way, physics and also-- so he-- he-- he also had physics as a major along with whether it be economics or Wharton. But in any case, he-- he-- he certainly has an extra chip on-- in him. And this is part of-- you know, Elon Musk started this company 18 years ago. And it's a company that not only just focused-- not only focuses on the Crew Dragon and try-- and doing these missions to the ISS, to the moon, to-- wanting to go to Mars. But it makes its money also on satellites. So it's been in the satellite business for a long time.

There is also some talk about perhaps SpaceX wanting to spin off that satellite business in the future and go IPO with that. But certainly, I mean, this is his baby. Elon musk is-- he tweets about not just Tesla but also space. It's what he loves.