Book Review of “From the Garage to Mars: Memoir of a Space Entrepreneur”

by Leonard David

If you’ve got entrepreneurial dollars aligned with the needed spunk and spine to create a new space company, this book provides an insider, industrial strength look at what kind of roller coaster ride you may encounter.

The author founded Starsys Research Corporation of Boulder, Colorado, an innovative business that, quite literally, had wax flowing through its veins. Starsys pioneered thermal “actuator” technology and mechanical systems for spacecraft – critical items that open, close, deploy, and move components on spacecraft, like opening lens caps.

Such devices can make or break a mission, be it in Earth orbit or crossing the intervening void to reach Mars, Saturn, and elsewhere.

Tibbitts candid and sleep-stealing worries included confronting this self-imagined and calamitous news headline:

“Space Motor Made by Small Space Company in Boulder, Colorado Fails. Billion Dollar NASA Mission Lost. CEO/Entrepreneur Scott Tibbitts says: “I’m stumped…it seemed to be working just fine before we put it on the rocket.”

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