NASA announced another delay for its Artemis 3 mission, pushing the first manned lunar landing since 1972 to mid-2027. Technical problems with the Orion spacecraft’s heat shield were cited as the primary reason for the postponement.

“Safety is our top priority, and we won’t proceed until we are ready,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. He emphasized that the delay will still keep the U.S. ahead of China’s plan to send a crewed mission to the Moon by 2030.

Artemis 1 successfully sent the uncrewed Orion capsule around the Moon in 2022, but subsequent missions have faced repeated setbacks.

The development of the current generation of AI chatbots has relied heavily on specialized microprocessors, pioneered by Nvidia, which has dominated the market and become a symbol of the artificial intelligence boom.

However, the same qualities that make these GPU (graphics processing unit) chips so effective for building powerful AI systems from scratch render them less efficient for running AI products on a daily basis. This has created opportunities in the AI chip industry for rivals aiming to compete with Nvidia by offering so-called AI inference chips. These chips are specifically designed to handle the operational needs of AI tools while cutting down on the significant costs associated with generative AI.

“These companies see opportunities for this kind of specialized hardware,” said Jacob Feldgoise, an analyst at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology. “As the adoption of these models grows, the need for inference calculations will increase, driving demand for inference chips.”

The United States, spearheaded by SpaceX, dominated rocket launches in the year 2023. Elon Musk’s company, SpaceX, conducted a total of 96 launches throughout the year with its Falcon 9, maintaining an impressive pace of almost two launches per week. This effort focused on the continuous expansion of the Starlink internet satellite constellation.

Thanks to SpaceX’s achievements, the United States once again stood out in the global market of space launchers, with a total of 107 orbital flights in 2023, significantly surpassing other players in this strategic sector.

SpaceX not only limited itself to Falcon 9 launches but also deployed its Falcon Heavy to orbit the military space drone X-37B. Additionally, two tests of the super-heavy Starship launcher, intended for the Artemis missions to the Moon, were conducted, although both ended in explosions. SpaceX’s ambition for the coming year is to achieve an impressive 12 flights per month, totaling 144 flights in the year, as stated by SpaceX’s Vice President, Bill Gerstenmaier, before the U.S. Senate in October.

Despite U.S. dominance, China is rapidly expanding its space activities with 67 launches in 2023. Russia, on the other hand, carried out 19 launches, with 17 of them involving the Soyuz rocket. Rocket Lab, the U.S. and New Zealand-based company, successfully launched its Electron rocket nine times, establishing itself as one of the few operational mini-launchers.

India, through the ISRO space agency, completed seven successful launches in 2023 and kicked off 2024 with the launch of a PSLV rocket placing a scientific satellite into orbit.

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In Europe, undergoing a launcher crisis, only three launches occurred in 2023. However, autonomous access to space is expected to be regained with the inaugural flight of Ariane 6 scheduled for mid-June and the Vega-C flight at the end of the year.

Japan, with three launches in 2023, faced challenges with the failure of the new heavy launcher H-3. The Japanese space agency, JAXA, announced a new attempt scheduled for February 15th.