[lamontcg]

> ESA is doing really cool stuff, but they're doing a bad job of convincing people that they're doing cool stuff.

Why does it matter?

They don't need to convince you that they're doing "cool stuff", they need to convince the people who want to put up satellites that they're going to offer cheap cost-competitive launch vehicles.

[MrDresden]

ESA is a government run entity and as such definitely needs the public behind it when it comes to funding.

Not realising that would be gross incompetence on their part.

[M2Ys4U]

ESA is an IGO, it's not beholden to any one government, not even the EU (which has their own space agency, EUSPA).

ESA's member states might need to show their publics what they're doing with public money, and they do that, in part, by showing their collaboration with other ESA partners on projects.

[jmyeet]

The ESA is a political entity that relies on state funding and support. It absolutely neds good PR so the people feel like they're doing good work. It makes it easier for politicians to keep giving them that money and support.

They absolutely need to convince us they're doing "cool stuff".

[martin8412]

No. They just need to award contracts to companies in the member countries. It creates plenty of jobs.

[colordrops]

There's a halo effect. For instance all the PR that SpaceX has done has attracted a massive amount of talent.

[sebzim4500]

But realistically that isn't going to happen, so they have to convince the EU to pump money into it instead.

[martin8412]

No..

SpaceX funding comes from the members of ESA. The member countries are proportionally awarded contracts developing things for ESA in return.

[martin8412]

ESA funding*