Starfighters Space CEO says ‘space is the future’ | Official Website of Louis Velazquez, entrepreneur, finance guy and tech innovator

Tim Franta will meet you in the future.

The newly minted CEO of the recently public aerospace company Starfighters Space (FJET) scheduled that date when he rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange.

“I did not know that for the bell ringing, you have to give a speech when you walk out,” he said during the Feb. 25 edition of TheStreet Pro’s Stocks & Markets Podcast.

“So, I had a few minutes to think before I walked out. And I said ‘Starfighters believes that space is the future. And we’ll meet you there.’”

Chris Versace, Stocks and Markets podcast host and TheStreet Pro’s Portfolio manager, described Starfighters Space as “the only commercial company in the world with the ability to fly payloads at sustained Mach 2+,” which exceeds twice the speed of sound or roughly 1,534 mph for all you top gunners out there.Starfighters Space recently underwent a major leadership change. The company’s founder, Rick Svetkoff, 72, resigned as CEO, president, chairman, and director, while his spouse, Brenda Svetkoff, stepped down as company secretary.

Tim Franta, who was named the company’s chief executive on Feb. 23, takes over during a dynamic period for the company.

Starfighters Space’s capabilities include suborbital and orbital launches of experiments and small payloads.

“I cannot tell you how exciting this time is,” Franta said. “I lived on the Space Coast in Florida most of my life, and 14 years ago, we had 12 launches a year. We’re going to have over 150 this year.”

Declaring that “we’re at a truly different age,” Franta, former chief of staff for the Florida Space Authority, compared the industry’s rapid expansion to the explosion of the app market in 2007, driven primarily by the first iPhone from Apple (AAPL).

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Starfighters Space CEO Tim Franta rang the opening bell on the New York Stock Exchange.

The space industry is ‘taking off’

“Before 2007, apps did not exist,” he said. “No one knew what was going to happen with apps. They thought they knew. And some of them were 100% correct. But there were so many organic things that happened with apps and market-driven things for apps. The same thing is happening with space.”

Among those space-related events are NASA’s upcoming Artemis II mission, which will send four astronauts on a 10-day trip to fly around the Moon, and the anticipated initial public offering of SpaceX following its merger with Elon Musk’s xAI.

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“That is going to be big news for a number of reasons, including the size of that transaction,” Versace said. “Are you watching that as a barometer? Because I would have to think that the extent it goes well, that’s probably good for Starfighters.”

“Oh yes,” Franta said. “It helps everyone on down the line. And, boy, every person at the ringing of the bell — and I mean every person — asked me about the SpaceX IPO. Every single person there.”

Some of Starfighters Space’s customers include Lockheed Martin (LMT), GE Aerospace (GE), Space Florida, and the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory.

“You’re partnering with the Air Force Research Lab to develop and test hypersonic rockets,” Versace said. “My understanding is that hypersonic rockets and related projectiles travel — and I couldn’t believe this — between 5 and 25 times the speed of sound … somewhere between 1 and 5 miles per second.”

CEO: Things are moving fast at the Pentagon

“Yes, there’s a ton of work for Starfighters there and in the national interest,” Franta said, explaining that the U.S. was number one in hypersonic technology up until about 2017, “when China and Russia creeped up.”

Russia has attacked Ukraine several times using hypersonic missiles, and China tested a long-range missile in mid-2021 that was capable of global flight and delivery of a hypersonic glide vehicle.

“That was pretty scary,” Franta said.

On the plus side, he said, the U.S. Defense Department is accelerating testing and development, “which then accelerates the actual deployment.”

“So, things are moving very fast at the Pentagon,” he said. “It is absolutely brilliant. It made me feel safer knowing the new philosophy is to get things tested and ready. And as much of it is about avoiding the old traps. It is truly remarkable what the Pentagon is doing for hypersonics. And the President also issued an executive order that also helped.”

On Jan. 27, 2025, President Donald Trump signed an executive order, “The Iron Dome for America,” directing the Department of Defense to develop advanced missile defense systems targeting hypersonic, ballistic, and cruise threats.

Looking ahead, Franta maintained that he is not afraid of failure.

“My fear is the typical space industry worry, things sliding to the right,” he said, using the industry expression to describe project delays. “That is the number one fear because 99% of the time, you can find an engineering solution or an operation solution. It’s just sliding to the right that is my biggest fear. I try to reduce risk. I try to reduce time.”