>>11189247>Why aren't the legacy space launch companies (ULA in the US, Arianespace in Europe and so on) investing in developing retropropulsive landing?Many reasons, and I'll list some of them.
>It's still a largely unproven technology economically speaking>Legacy companies develop at a much slower pace than SpaceX>Reusability requires a different structure within the company both in ground equipment and management, legacy companies don't have the luxury of changing quickly>Expendable rockets are still good for the kinds of payloads being made today with most cases being just as good as reusable rockets from the perspective of a customer>Their primary customers are risk intolerant and this are happy to use older but 'safe' technologies over new 'dangerous' ones>How are they going to compete with SpaceX and Blue Origin if their rockets are still expendable?That last point above is a good way. Reusable launchers are the way for the 'new' market, but the 'old' market is still profitable to cater to and that market does not prefer reusable launchers (or rather they prefer launchers with traits that reusable launchers can't provide right now). Legacy companies also have close ties with the government and that gives them the privilege of being a preferred launch provider over the newer companies.
