launch – Smoking-Jackets

The private space exploration company — headed by Tesla (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk — plans to launch another mission to space on Thursday at 6 pm ET out of Cape Canaveral in Florida. But this mission has the potential to be historic. That’s because this is the first time SpaceX will reuse a rocket that has already traveled to space and then returned safely to Earth.

SpaceX will attempt to re-land the first-stage rocket booster again after it flies Thursday.

The ability to reuse rockets is key to making space travel more affordable. Rockets cost tens of millions of dollars, and in the past they’ve typically just been left to burn up in the atmosphere after launch.

Neither SpaceX nor its customer for this mission — Luxembourg-based communications satellite operator SES — disclosed the financial terms of the deal. But both parties confirmed to CNNMoney in August that SES will get a discount on the $62 million sticker price of a launch because SpaceX is reusing an old rocket.

Over the past couple of years, SpaceX has made 13 attempts to recover the first stage of its Falcon 9 rockets, and so far eight have been successful.

Five of those eight landings happened on remotely controlled platforms — called droneships — in the ocean. The other three occurred on solid ground.

Thursday will mark the first time SpaceX attempts to put one of those used rockets back in the air.

The rocket SpaceX will use Thursday first flew in an April 2016 mission to the International Space Station. After liftoff, the rocket booster landed safely a droneship in the Atlantic Ocean.

SpaceX first planned to reuse a rocket last year. But the company had to push back the date after a different rocket, which was new, exploded spontaneously at Cape Canaveral in September, causing months of launch delays for SpaceX.

SpaceX is not the only private space venture to successfully re-land a rocket, and it won’t be the first to re-launch a rocket either. Blue Origin — the company run by Amazon (AMZN, Tech30) CEO Jeff Bezos — has completed the feat several times.

But those were all suborbital missions, meaning Bezos’s rockets never ventured much more than 60 miles from the Earth’s surface.

SpaceX completes much more difficult missions. On Thursday, it’s destined for geosynchronous orbit — which is located more than 22,000 miles from Earth.

SES chief technology officer Martin Halliwell said Tuesday that it will be a difficult feat to land the rocket again after Thursday’s mission — but if they succeed, SES will take home some souvenirs.

“[SpaceX] has promised me some bits of the rocket,” Halliwell said. “Hopefully, we’ll have some bits and pieces that we can take back and put in the foyer of our board room.”

CNNMoney (New York) First published March 29, 2017: 11:58 AM ET

Samsung (SSNLF) unveiled the Galaxy S8 and S8+ at an event in New York on Wednesday. The new phone displays are bigger than the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge and they have curved screens that flow onto the sides.

For the first time on a Samsung phone, the physical home button is removed entirely. (This is already the case on most other Android devices.)

The S8 will be the first phone to feature Bixby, Samsung’s new AI assistant. Despite a crowded voice assistant market, Samsung insists Bixby is “fundamentally” different from competitors like Apple’s (AAPL, Tech30) Siri and Amazon’s (AMZN, Tech30) Alexa. It remains to be seen how this will play out. Samsung touts the assistant as being able to “see, remind and recommend,” but much of this functionality is already available with rival assistants. One potentially interesting feature is the ability to observe behavior patterns and add in reminders. For instance, if you usually call your mom at a specific time each day, Bixby will ask you, unprompted, if you’d like to call her at that time.

Samsung plans to make Bixby available on all of its appliances, from air conditioners to TVs. There is a designated Bixby button on the side of the S8, which is unlike its rivals.

Like previous models, the S8 can be submerged for 30 minutes in up to 5 feet of water.

People can also use facial recognition to unlock the phone, which Samsung has offered in the past. The Galaxy Note 7’s iris scanner allows you to open the phone with your eyes and the new phones will offer this tech as well.

Samsung planned to release pricing later Wednesday. Preorders start on Thursday and the phone will begin shipping April 21.. The S8 will initially be available in midnight black, orchid gray and arctic silver in the U.S.

The South Korean tech giant has a lot to prove following the global recall of its exploding Galaxy Note 7s.

“As you all know, it has been a challenging year for Samsung. A year filled with valuable lessons, hard decisions and important new beginnings,” DJ Kho, president of Samsung’s mobile communications business, said onstage at Wednesday’s event.

Problems with the Note 7s arose shortly after the launch last August, with several complaints of devices catching fire when charging. Some replacement phones also caught on fire.

Samsung initially blamed faulty batteries, but some experts believe a design flaw may have been the cause. The recall wiped out billions of dollars of profits and hurt Samsung’s brand.

“The launch of the new device must be perfectly executed for Samsung to gain innovation leadership and to gain market share in the high-end smartphone segment,” said Thomas Husson, vice president and principal analyst at research and advisory firm Forrester.

Samsung’s Galaxy S8 will also be going up against the newest version of the iPhone, which is due out later this year. Expectations are high for the new phone, likely called the iPhone 8, partially because this year is the 10th anniversary of the device.

“Samsung only has a window of opportunity of several months before the launch of the 10th anniversary iPhone,” Husson said. “The launch of Samsung’s new flagship smartphone is thus key for the brand even though it has managed to reduce its business dependency on smartphones, contrary to Apple.”

Despite the Note 7 debacle, Samsung reported a profit of 9.2 trillion won ($7.9 billion) for its most recent quarter, an increase of 50% from the year prior and its highest level in three years.

CNNMoney (New York) First published March 29, 2017: 11:03 AM ET

A first for SpaceX: Sending a used rocket into space

Samsung reveals Galaxy S8 and S8+