Derbyshire software expert Rob Lowe is leading a project to offer cheap tourist trips into space. Oliver Astley reports.
WHEN Rob Lowe first got a primitive personal computer as a teenager in the late 70s, he used his early skills to develop a graphic simulating a Space Shuttle launch.
This March, he took a giant leap towards the real thing.
He was selected to become the UK head of ShipInSpace, a company spearheading a revolutionary project in commercial space travel.
The firm's rocket-propelled vehicle is by far the largest commercial spaceship currently in development, eclipsing in size both Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic and another American firm, Xcor.
A total of 48 passengers will travel in groups of four inside pods near the nose cone of the spacecraft. For about seven minutes of the 40-minute flight, passengers will experience weightlessness.
Windows will be 80cm in diameter, allowing passengers a dramatic view of our planet more than 100km above its surface.
The company says that its innovations will allow it to develop, manufacture and launch its first spacecraft within five years and offer seats on it for £60,000.
Mr Lowe, of Duffield, said: "Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic programme has already secured $120 million of ticket sales and this will be a multi-billion-dollar industry."
Uniquely, in the fledgling industry of commercial space travel, in the event of a catastrophic equipment failure or explosion, the passenger pods will separate from the craft.
Parachutes will ensure that travellers in undamaged pods will reach Earth safely.
Mr Lowe said: "I'll definitely be on one of the early flights and it would be great to take my three children.
"One of the first things I did when I got the ZX80 (an early personal computer and a precursor to the ZX Spectrum) was to make an image of a Space Shuttle and get it to launch on screen so to be asked to be part of ShipInSpace was amazing."
Fabrizio Boer is the chief executive officer of ShipInSpace, and the brains behind the technology.
He recruited Mr Lowe because of his software expertise and experience working on secure communication systems with Nasa.
The investment required to get it into commercial operation is expected to be at least one billion pounds.
In this, the initial stage of the project, it is Mr Lowe's responsibility to speak to potential investors.
He said: "I have been in London talking to potential investors and there are lots of people genuinely interested in the potential of commercial space travel, so I don't see finance as being a problem.
"The costs really start to rise when you look at manufacturing, assembly and launching and operations. In total, a figure of around one billion pounds is realistic."
Ultimately, once the technology is deemed safe, deposits and advance ticket sales will help fund the massive project, but the bulk of funding will come from professional investors.
The first £5 million of funding has been secured through Black Star Global Enterprises. Mr Lowe will be responsible for the IT systems behind the technology.
With 48 paying passengers, each flight will generate £2.88 million, with each launch expected to cost £1 million.
The design of the spacecraft will allow passenger capacity to go up without major modifications and it could carry as many as 96 people.
Within seven years, ShipInSpace aims to capture 90% of the commercial space travel market, expected to be worth many billions in the coming decades.
Like Nasa's Space Shuttle, it will take off vertically and land horizontally, powered by a liquid rocket engine fuelled with liquid oxygen and rocket propellant.
It will be some seven times larger than its rivals and the company believes that it will usher in a new era for space tourism and the space industry as a whole.
The company argues that its technology is both cheaper and safer than rival systems, bringing the dream of space travel to a far larger number of people.
One ambition of the firm is for its spaceship to reach the same levels of safety as commercial aircraft.
In comparison, Virgin Galactic's VSS Enterprise will carry half a dozen paying passengers while Xcor's Lynx will only have one space tourist per voyage. And higher volumes of passengers means cheaper space flight within the financial reach of more people.
The £60,000 price tag currently attached to ShipInSpace flights could drop by between £5,000 and £10,000 with the development of more spacecraft.
Space tourists already exist for the super rich, several of whom have paid millions of dollars to visit space in Russian rockets.
A 2010 report from the American Federal Aviation Administration cited a study from an aerospace and technology-consulting firm that said space tourism could become a billion-dollar market in 20 years.
Mr Lowe said: "Space tourism will be a multi-billion-pound industry and it seems incredible to be a part of it."
ROB'S EXPERTISEROB Lowe has a history of working on cutting-edge technology.
He was programme manager on the multi-million-pound development of the world's first smartphone for Motorola and Psion. First demonstrated in 2000, the Odin device was the first phone to have wireless internet connectivity.
In 1999, he was in Seattle, working for Microsoft on a project to create the Chinese version of Windows.
His expertise was used to prepare the IT infrastructure for the multi-billion-pound sale of the consultancy arm of accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers to IBM.
Mr Lowe worked for British Midland Airways to help ensure that anticipated Y2K computer glitches would not cause planes to fall out of the sky as 1999 turned into 2000.
Other projects he has been involved in include helping set up the online Government Gateway for the Department for Work and Pensions and travel operation Ebookers.
In the mid-90s, he worked at Nexor, in Nottingham, the firm that developed the world's first internet search engine.
