Think Like a Rocket Scientist: Simple Strategies You Can Use to Make Giant Leaps in Work and Life

by Ozan Varol

Simplicity also reduces costs. The Atlas V rocket—which has taken many objects, including military satellites and Mars rovers, into space—uses up to three types of engines for different stages of flight.42 This complexity drives up the expenses: “To a first-order approximation,” Musk explains, “you’ve just tripled your factory costs and all your operational costs.” In contrast, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 has two stages with the same diameter and the same engines built from the same aluminum-lithium alloy. This simplicity enables high-volume production at a lower cost, while boosting reliability. What’s more, unlike other aerospace companies that build their vehicles vertically—in the same position that they’re launched—SpaceX assembles them horizontally.43 This orientation allows the company to use a regular warehouse, eliminating the need to build a skyscraper—not to mention the safety issues that come with workers dangling sixty feet in the air while building a rocket. “Every decision we’ve made,” Musk says, “has been with consideration to simplicity.… If you’ve got fewer components, that’s fewer components to go wrong and fewer components to buy.”