MUSK TO LAY OFF 600 WORKERS

ELON MUSK’S rocket company SpaceX will reduce its workforce by about 10 percent of the company’s more than

6 000 employees, it said on Friday. The company said it would “part ways” with some of its manpower, citing “extraordinarily difficult challenges ahead. To continue delivering for our customers and to succeed in developing interplanetary spacecraft and a global space-based Internet, SpaceX must become a leaner company. Either of these developments, even when attempted separately, have bankrupted other organisations,” a spokesperson said in an email. In June, Elon Musk fired at least seven people in the senior management team leading a SpaceX satellite launch project, it was reported in November. The firings were related to disagreements over the pace at which the team was developing and testing its Starlink satellites. SpaceX’s Starlink programme is competing with OneWeb and Canada’s Telesat to be the first to market with a new satellite-based internet service. Last month, SpaceX launched its first US national security space mission. | Reuters