Space Business Podcast #114 - Andrew Nutter, Gama Space: Light Sails

Light sails – really thin sails that are propelled by photons flying around in space – have been proposed as an alternative propulsion method to travel the cosmos for a long time. Now, there is a startup company in France working to commercialize them. Their co-founder & CEO, Andrew Nutter, is our guest this week. Enjoy! SPACE ECONOMY BOOK: Raphael's fully revised introductory book on the Space economy, "To Infinity" - https://a.co/d/6jIQ2LO Upcoming newsletter - sign up: https://spacebusiness.substack.com/ Follow us: Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/podcast_space LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/raphaelroettgen/ Instagram -  www.instagram.com/raphael_space/ Learn more about space & the space economy: Check out the edX/EPFL Space Economy MOOC: https://www.edx.org/course/new-space-economy The Space Business Podcast is sponsored by NanoAvionics. Support us at https://www.patreon.com/spacebusinesspodcast Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 2:01 Elevator pitch 2:49 Origin story 4:22 History of light sails 8:59 Planetary Society mission 11:12 Folding the sail 14:20 Hazards in space 16:04 Further specs of Gama's sail 17:56 Velocity and Acceleration Specs 22:23 Oumuamua 24:01 Use cases 30:16 Dragsail application 34:41 GTM & missions 37:51 Deep space demonstration 39:25 Timeline & long term vision for the company 42:24 Business Model 45:35 What else is interesting in space? 47:30 Sci-Fi