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Entrepreneurialism on the final frontier

Mining asteroids on the moon; background reports on job applicants and internet metasearch. It’s quite a broad portfolio for one entrepreneur, and yet Naveen Jain still finds time for philanthropy and running the World Innovation Institute. In part two of our interview, Jain discusses his ideas on space mining and the role of the private entrepreneur in this.

“We use riches from different continents to make life better. The interesting thing, is that there’s plenty of riches in space. Imagine that for billions of years, asteroids have been hitting the moon, and these asteroids are basically what we mine on Earth,” says Jain, of his ambitions to reap natural resources in space.

“Do you know why rare Earth elements are given that name? They are rare on Earth, but not on the moon. Imagine if we can bring these elements from other parts of space; Helium-3, platinum, and other catalysts that make humanity better.

“Our imagination is what limits us from doing these things. Nobody thought that private companies could go to space, they used to think it was something that only rich countries can do.”

Jain admires the success of entrepreneurs like Elon Musk, the South African who founded Paypal and private space outfit, SpaceX.

He adds: “Most of the parts we are using are actually off-the-shelf. We’re doing things like taking autonomous vehicles and putting software into them to see if it will work.

“We’re just doing things differently. People say that entrepreneurs are risk takers, and actually entrepreneurs are never take risks. The first thing that entrepreneurs do is to ‘de-risk’ everything.”

The question with space development and exploration is, where do you start? Jain suggests it’s a stepping stone process in which you first aim for the “low hanging fruit.”

He continues: “We know that an asteroid can have trillions of dollars of platinum in it. My thinking was not to just go to one asteroid, hoping that’s the right one. I thought why don’t we go to the moon.

“There’s a number of advantages to this. Number one: there’s no atmosphere. This means that as asteroids are hitting the moon, they don’t blow up or melt away like they do on Earth. And number two: there’s no tectonic activity. All these asteroids are still on the surface because they are not being pulled into the core of the Earth.”

So, just how much money are we talking here? At one point it cost $1bn to launch a rocket, but now, Jain says, it is possible to make a launch for $50m.

Jain points to other private space entrepreneurs including the likes of Microsoft founder Paul Allen; Amazon founder Jeff Bezos; and Richard Branson. He suggests the price of space travel will ultimately come down to the cost of fuel, as reusable rockets and equipment are developed.

Of course, the good of humanity is not Jain’s only ambition in these space exploits. It makes business sense.

He adds: “My philosophy is doing well by doing good. I’m doing this because it’s a great business, but it also happens to do tremendous good if we get it right.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .