Hans Koenigsmann: At SpaceX, We Started With the Hard Part First

Hans Koenigsmann on joining Elon at SpaceX in 2002: “We always started with the hard part first. I liked that philosophy.”

“Sometimes you come in and you talk about what you do, and then you feel like, oh, this is exactly what I was thinking too. Many decisions basically fall into place. For example, we want to build an engine that has a turbo pump. And I thought, okay, this is exactly what I think is right.

I felt like a lot of these things that we discussed were going in the right direction from the get-go.

One thing we did is we always started with the hard part first. Let's start it today because this is hard and let's not delay this. And I like that philosophy. It kind of made sense to me, and I felt like, okay, this is actually going the right way. It's not something like we're trying to buy this somewhere else. No, we want to do this ourselves. It's difficult. Let's start today because it is difficult.”

Interview Hans Koenigsmann by Układ Sił on Youtube, May 2, 2025