Hello, everyone: Dan Goldin here. 👆 Up there is my dear friend and American hero, Bill Shepherd — “Shep.” A former Navy SEAL, MIT-trained engineer, and the man I chose to be the 1st Commander of the International Space Station.

Shep was my trenchmate in the truest sense. We were huge PITAs to each other — always butting heads — but only because we were both deeply committed to the mission: building a permanent, livable, workable station in space. Not just as a symbol of American cooperation after 40 years of Cold War with the Soviets, but as an honest-to-God system designed to endure for an entire generation.

If you’re reading this, chances are you and your own trenchmates are building something meant to endure. Something generational. As the ISS nears the end of its operational life, Shep and I have been reflecting on the decisions that gave it the ability to endure. We’re not sharing them to look back, but to serve those of you building forward.

Hope it’s helpful.

🇺🇸🙏🖖 Goldin, out.

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The International Space Station is usually told as détente in orbit: Soviet-American rivals turned partners, shaking hands in vacuum. And I, Dan Goldin, can’t stop telling stories about the hell Congress gave me in getting it funded (as they should, by the way).

But almost no one studies the Station as a product, with users and uptime, interfaces and doctrine, and an organizational culture built to metabolize friction. The operating culture that created this generational system is the missing half of the story.

So we thought we’d reflect on what made the ISS work. Our latest online story, BUILDING THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION, is a plain-spoken case study in how to make something last in a hostile environment.

Because many of you are willing generational systems into existence today. With a quarter century of continuous operations, a vast user base, and compounding technological and scientific dividends, the ISS has earned the title of a generational system.

What can it teach the rest of us? Valuable lessons about organizational culture, complex engineering, respecting the physics, and making something that will last. So, go check out the full story. Borrow the relevant doctrines for your shipyard, factory, datacenter, or whatever else it is that you’re working on. And then go build something that stays up and online for generations.

For decades, U.S. space missions moved at a glacial pace, unable to deliver when America needed to respond quickly. Firefly is changing that story. In 2023, Firefly proved it can launch a satellite to orbit with just 24-hour notice and became the only commercial company to demonstrate a true responsive space capability. In 2025, Firefly achieved the first fully successful commercial Moon landing with Blue Ghost Mission 1. This speed comes from Firefly's vertically integrated approach. The company designs, builds, and operates its Alpha launch vehicle, Blue Ghost lunar lander, and Elytra orbital transfer vehicle using common flight-proven structures, propulsion systems, avionics, and software. And the company is scaling fast. Firefly's next-generation Eclipse launch vehicle, co-developed with Northrop Grumman, will deliver up to 16,000 kg to orbit while maintaining that same responsive edge for national security, commercial, and space exploration missions. Firefly’s proven launch, lunar, and in-space capabilities will continue to drive U.S. innovation across cislunar space and beyond while delivering the speed and reliability that national priorities demand.

Telco leviathon Huawei has rolled out new accelerators, memory chips, and networking gear in a bid to challenge the top dog. In parallel, China has moved to throttle market access for that top dog, effectively instituting a de facto ban on Nvidia gear for its tech sector.

More Nvidia…The $4.5T giant pledged this week to invest up to $100B in OpenAI, as part of a joint effort to build 10 GW worth of datacenters in the coming years. Stateside, the world’s most valuable firm also last week invested $5B in Intel and effectively set itself up to “second-source” datacenter CPUs the beleaguered American chipmaker. The two will also jointly develop multiple new generations of x86 products. This is a welcome move. As we recently wrote, “Intel’s last mission is to transform itself from a conflicted conglomerate into America’s sovereign foundry.”

Less is more. Meta’s long-awaited augmented reality lineup, unveiled last week, is a case study in form dictating function. The Ray-Ban Meta Display, Oakley Vanguard for athletes, and an EMG “neural band” wrist controller shrink AR down to something non-techies might wear. Instead of maximalist immersion, hardware choices (battery, sensor, lens, fit) and features are dictated by practicality. As our resident AR expert Jeff put it: “I have more hopes than normal that this will catch in some way.”

FRIENDS IN HIGH, HARD PLACES
What did friends of Per Aspera get done this past week?

A whole lot of helium-3. Rob Meyerson — Per Aspera reader, former Blue Origin president, and now CEO/cofounder of Interlune — and his team just scored the largest space resource deal on record. Bluefors, the Finnish maker of ultra-cold dilution refrigerators and cryocoolers used across most quantum systems, committed to buy up to 10,000 liters of lunar helium-3 annually for 2028-2037. The deal value, exceeding $300M, signals both quantum’s growth curve and a looming bottleneck: helium-3 scarcity.

A persistent tooling problem. From car panels to medical devices, manufactured products begin with custom tools and dies that shape raw materials into precise parts. This tooling requires craftsmen whose expertise takes years to develop, yet America's tool and die workforce is aging out as critical skill shortages mount. Enter Atomic Industries, the Detroit startup led by vocal reindustrialist Aaron Slodov. Atomic, which just raised its $25M Series A, teaches AI to absorb the tribal knowledge of tool & die making, digitize the craft, and optimize/accelerate production systems of precision molds, dies, and cutting tools. Ultimately, this technology allows operators to scale and redefine the bounds of what American factories can build — a very worthy mission indeed.

Last but not least, we want to extend a well-deserved congratulations to the 2025 Astronaut Candidate Class, an all-American crew of ten selected from 8,000+ applicants. Since selecting the original Mercury Seven in 1959, NASA now has recruited 370 astronaut candidates. Read more about the 2025 class and their insanely impressive resumes here.

PER ASPERA AFTER DARK
The Director’s Cut, filled with surplus stories, developments, signals, and data that stood out while we were pulling together today’s edition.

Netflix to add NASA+ as first live feed from outside programmer // China lays out its own end-to-end planetary defense architecture, and U.S. officials fret PRC is close to cracking reusable lift // Jaguar Land Rover production offline for last 3+ weeks after cyberattack // Microsoft introduces Fairwater DC in Wisconsin, its “largest and most sophisticated AI factory” to date // the hyperscaler brought 2 GW capacity online last year alone // Golden Dome blueprint completed, questions remain on cost // xAI laid groundwork for Colussus 2 via “genius” zoning trick // JP Morgan on the New Energy Security Age: hydrocarbons ↓ , critical minerals, electric grids, nuclear, R&D ↑ // Army field-testing AR headsets from Anduril/Meta team and Palantir-backed Rivet // Chinese rare-earth exports hit highest level since 2012, ahead of Xi-Trump call // U.S. wholesale electricity prices are up ~35% since 2020, what gives? // PJM tries to ease threats to grid from supersize DCs // NASA deep space laser comms demo a resounding success // World’s fastest production car is now a Chinese supercar, following BYD’s new 308 MPH record with the Yangwang U9 Xtreme.

Got news to share? Breaking ground, shipping hardware, or hitting a milestone? We want to hear about it, and so might thousands of your fellow Renaissance-pilled readers. Whether it’s a factory floor, the test stand, or your unique trials & tribulations on the hard path, show us your work and strut your stuff. Reply here or drop us a line at [email protected] ↗