The concept of a space economy often conjures up images of distant, sci-fi futures, but in reality, it’s a present and rapidly evolving aspect of our daily lives. On this episode of Future Ready Business, co-hosts Art Cavazos and Will Nilson talk with Space Lawyer Bailey Reichelt about her work and how space law isn’t just about international treaties and policies, but also about their practical, day-to-day application.
Bailey’s journey is fascinating – from her initial aspirations to join the Air Force and a stint as a public defender, to co-founding the space law focused Aegis Law Firm. Her work centers on providing accessible legal counsel to space startups, navigating the complex regulations that govern this exciting industry.
While many of us think of the impact of space technology as being dominated by a few individuals and companies, Reichelt discusses how startups and smaller businesses play a role in creating technologies that touch all aspects of our lives.
Featured This Episode
| Our Hosts: | |
Art Cavazos |
Will Nilson |
| Episode Guest: | |
Bailey Reichelt |
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Episode Transcription
Art Cavazos: Hi, I’m Art Cavazos, a corporate and finance lawyer with Jackson Walker, and this is Future Ready Business. The opinions expressed today do not necessarily reflect the views of Jackson Walker, its clients or any of their respective affiliates. This podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. I’m joined today by my co-host, Will Nilson. And we’re excited to be talking about the final frontier. I don’t think anybody actually uses that phrase anymore. But the final frontier of business with our special guests, very special guests Space Lawyer, Bailey, and Bailey, I don’t want to butcher your last name. And also, I’d like to let our guests introduce themselves so folks can kind of hear your voice and tie that to you. So, Bailey, could you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Bailey Reichelt: Yeah, of course. My name is Bailey Reichelt. It took me a while to learn how to say it to my maiden name was Smith. And that was a lot easier. But yeah, hi, I’m Bailey Reichelt. I’m an attorney. I like to use the term space lawyer. It’s really fun. But what I really do is I’m a regulatory and corporate counsel for space companies. When we talk about space law, there’s two big buckets. One is international treaties and policy, and one is how you apply those treaties in domestic and day to day practice. And I’m in that second bucket. My experience, well I guess I should say, who I worked for, I worked for Aegis space law. It’s a small boutique law firm, I co-founded it with my partner, Jack Shelton. And we focus on space startups, which we found to be a relatively underserved industry just because of how expensive regulatory attorneys tend to be. So, we serve the startup to mid-sized company market. And we help them navigate the very complex regulations that space companies and aerospace companies necessarily have to deal with. Some of the other things I’ve worked on, we recently spun off a nonprofit called the Association of Commercial Space Professionals. And we take lots and lots of regulatory topics, try to break them down so that companies can actually just go and get the information themselves and start building their strategies internally. And basically, try to save as much of their operating budget as possible, rather than spend it all on outside counsel, and consultants. So ACSP has a big educational mission with regards to regulatory strategy for space. So, we work on that my background is in house as trade compliance for aerospace companies and subcontractors. And I guess that’s really it.
Art Cavazos: Great. Well, thank you for that, Bailey. And Will for those who haven’t listened to previous episodes, could you tell us who you are and what you’re here to talk about today?
William Nilson: Absolutely. My name is Will Nilson. And I’m a commercial real estate attorney. So, the space I deal with is much more dirt space than aerospace and other kinds of space. So, I have a very limited focus compared to Bailey, I would say. I have been practicing for about nine years. For four years, Jackson Walker, and I’m excited to talk about space law today. I’m going to learn a lot I know that I’m sure Art knows already a lot more about this than I do just haven’t talked with Bailey a bit. And Greg as well. So, I’m excited to learn from you. Bailey. Thank you for very much for being here.
Art Cavazos: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you both really, for joining us. So, Bailey, I wanted to kind of dive into your area of expertise, first space law. But we won’t you know, entirely focus on regulations and things like that. Well actually hopefully we won’t focus at all on, you know, the really technical stuff. But what drew you to be interested in commercial space law? And what is commercial space law? Because actually, one thing that I did want to say at the outset is, I think for a lot of folks, this sounds very, you know, space law. It’s, you know, of the future, but not at all we live in the space economy today, right?
Bailey Reichelt: Absolutely. A lot of people have really interesting stories about why they want to practice space law. Most of them have to do with like childhood dreams to be an astronaut. And I have to admit, I didn’t ever want to be an astronaut. My story’s a little bit different. I did go to Space Camp. So there is that and I did think space is very cool. But originally, yeah, some space campers out there?
William Nilson: I’m a Space Camp alum. Absolutely. I grew up in Tallahassee, Florida.
Art Cavazos: Yeah, my wife’s from Houston. She’s big, big NASA buff.
Bailey Reichelt: Yeah, I mean, space is cool. It’s especially cool when you’re little and you’re thinking about the all the possibilities, right? So why I wanted to go into space really had more to do with I had a desire to join the Air Force. And I actually did one semester on Air Force ROTC while I was in law school, and I thought that my best way to serve in the Air Force would be as a JAG, you have this special concentration in Air and Space Law. You know, Air Force, Air and Space Law. Seem like That would be a really good way to start. I ended up leaving ROTC because I ended up eloping in law school to an Air Force officer. And so I just decided I was going to go private so that we could stay together. But we first got sent to Texas. And it turned out that air and space law didn’t exist as a career when we got sent to Dyess Air Force Base in Abilene, Texas in 2014. So I ended up practicing as a public defender for a while. That was never what I intended to do, like I said, studied Air and Space Law in law school. And I ended up doing what I needed to to become a practicing attorney, because sometimes you just need to start doing something right. And what I ended up learning by being a public defender and I did a lot of Child Protective Services, is that by the time you get to the counsel table, you’ve really lost the battle. I mean, you can still do noble work there. But you are not solving the problem, you’re only treating symptoms. And one of the issues that was very pervasive among my clients, many were adults, they could not read. And Reading is Fundamental to surviving in our society.
It’s very limited work available to young women who cannot read, and that work tends to be illegal. One of the things we’ve seen that like Starlink has done is opened up internet access to everyone everywhere and driven down the cost of a lot of space technology. And with that comes the ability for someone to access the internet anywhere and teach themselves anything without having to admit to their friends and family that they’re lacking a crucial skill. So, there’s a lot that goes into public defense work and public service work. And that’s like respecting the individual. And you know how embarrassing it is to tell someone I can’t open a bank account, because I actually don’t know how to read. The soft skills I learned in public defense work and litigating really drove home that space is important, because space opens up technology terrestrially, what it takes to keep a human alive to go to Mars is an obscene amount of innovation. It’s radiation shielding, it’s recycling of water, it’s growing plants in zero gravity with no light. If you can do that in space, it can do a heck of a lot on Earth. And what that does is quadruple crop yields, it feeds those who are starving and in famine, it drives down the cost of access to everything. Fundamentally raises the poverty line and gets at some of those systemic issues that plague society. And once I started realizing that I really had my driver for why I wanted to go back into space, why I wanted to work with companies that were creating foundational life changing technologies. And if I can just be the person or the link or my firm is the link that helps those engineers figure out how to talk to the government to get those technologies, actually on orbit and changing the world. I will die a pretty happy person. That’s really why I’m here today.
Art Cavazos: You mentioned you know, raising the poverty line and kind of these amazing things that can be done with kind of space technology, and businesses. Could you give us kind of some examples of some kind of space businesses that you maybe work with or are aware of?
Bailey Reichelt: There’s so many, so feel free to cut me off. But one of the things I’ve been really impressed by some of the leaps in agriculture. Companies having new and innovative ways to concentrate nitrates as you know, nitrates are why you add fertilizer to a crop, they’ve been able to really triple and quadruple outputs in hydroponics and hydroponics are much more accessible where you don’t have gigantic land masses, right. And so they allow alternate forms of farming and food production, maybe with less mass transit from the major exporters that have those large land masses. So quadrupling yields and hydroponics, being able to grow things with LED lights, we’ve discovered that there’s certain formulations of like red/blue, that you can change these concentrations and inputs from the LEDs and the color of the spectrum, you’re feeding the plants through their different parts of their lifecycle, and speeds up their growth, and it helps them be more fruitful. That’s really useful on the International Space Station. And it’s really useful on Earth. It’s driving down the cost of food, and it’s driving down the cost of energy input. If you stop and think about trade or resources at all, everything comes back to energy. And if you can use LEDs instead of typical grow light, you dramatically cut that expense, making us more accessible in second and third world countries. So I told you, you’re gonna have to stop me from talking but pivoting right into energy. Energy is pretty fundamental. If you want to send things into space, you need to consider the types of energy that actually are sustainable off world they’re going to be susceptible to extreme temperatures and radiation.
Nuclear is one of the types of energy that’s being developed, if you’re familiar with the perseverance rover, had the big parachute that was red and white said dare great things that use a plutonium battery. So we’re seeing a lot of work. Maybe even by like automotive companies in modular nuclear reactors. They are much more portable, they’re much safer than nuclear ever has been. And it provides a sustainable and safe energy source, far beyond what you can do with just solar panels right now. One of the problems with energy sustainability on Earth. So when you start talking about wind and solar, there’s only so many locations that are actually well suited to generate wind and solar. But when you get into nuclear, though, it has a bit of a PR problem. It can go anywhere, including humanitarian situations. So my brother works for the State Department. And he’s very consistently talking to me about issues with energy generation in humanitarian crisis zones. That’s a big problem. And a lot of people are very concerned with environmental impacts, right? Well, if you think about the environmental impact of shipping, C-130s full of bottled water to people over and over again, and the damage that does, and how we could actually prevent that, because we could use some of these space technologies to do energy generation on site through power water filtration, to avoid us having to cause all these other band aids to be used. My point being there’s a lot of fundamental solutions with Space Technology, when applied terrestrially that stops all these other problems from cascading and us using a myriad of band aids just to kick them down to the next generation.
William Nilson: This is fascinating, I’m just absorbing, you know, I have a I personally have tried to track a little bit of nuclear power, kind of just how everything has gone over history, I have a friend from law school, who was really into it did a lot of papers on it and convinced me over time that it’s part of the necessary energy future. So, it’s very exciting when I hear you talk about from a space legal perspective, how important it is to consider nuclear power and the PR initiatives surrounding nuclear power. So that’s, that is modular is a very interesting topic to me.
Art Cavazos: I know you’re also interested in real estate, right? Real estate lawyer, obviously. And you were telling me recently about something I had never considered real estate on the moon, I hadn’t really considered buying a stretch of Moon beach. But apparently, that’s on the radar for some people?
William Nilson: Yeah, I think everything is probably going to mirror, it is so theoretical, with something like that. And based on treaties that are pretty old now, we’re really still in theory land on that. And that as a practical matter, innovation and regulation on that innovation tends to be the most the highest focus, highest and best use of legal energies in the space field.
Bailey Reichelt: Yeah, thanks for kind of bringing that around Will. I’m, well, it’s really fun to talk about things like property ownership on the moon, you’re right, there are a lot of international treaties and things we have to consider. It’s not really something you can do. It’s probably it is a topic that’s tossed around and in the international policy realm and a lot in academia. And there are a lot of people who are way smarter on that than I am. So, I’ll leave it to them and point you to resources if you want. But what I think is important right now is remembering we have to get to the moon. And that requires companies to actually succeed with their technological innovations on Earth. Part of that success is having other lines of business that are revenue generating, besides literally just space. Space is still a very small subset of the market. And if you can have revenue streams coming from the agriculture industry, while also working on your applications for space, you’re much more likely to be a successful business. And we need those businesses to successfully navigate domestic regulations, which are informed by some international treaties, before they can realistically get off world. And so, issues of property rights on the moon. They will be real issues at some point. But we have a lot of other steps in between now and then before that becomes, I think the forefront of what we focus on.
Art Cavazos: So, steer us in the right direction, Bailey because the next topic I would bring up is, you know, space being thought of as this playground for billionaires. But you know, you and I’ve spoken before, maybe I’m misguided?
Bailey Reichelt: Well, no, I mean, the things you stated are true. We are very happy, or the attention and publicity that the billionaire space race has drawn to commercial space, and very much has redefined what people conceived as doable, right and we’ve seen a big shift from space being realm of the government, to the realm of private sector, and that’s really important. But just don’t forget that there’s a world of other companies doing amazing things. There are lots of companies feeding technology into their final product. And we overlooked them a lot. But they’re doing a lot of really cool things. Like I was telling you about energy, or that descent and reentry parachute, all those come from some pretty incredible subcontractors too. But everything originated with these really talented other companies that don’t get a lot of PR. And those companies are everyday around you. And you may work for one of them right now and have no idea that they have that contract.
I guess my broader point is, please don’t leave this thinking of space as the playground for billionaires. While it is that, it is so much more. And it is so integral to our day-to-day life. If you again, I think agriculture is like the most relatable because everyone needs to eat. And I love eating personally, if you want to think about how that food gets grown and sent to your table, or how it gets exported around the world, those companies are using space technology. They’re using things that were developed for space, and they’re applying them terrestrially to benefit everyone. And there’s just so many of those stories, and so much innovation will occur and your grandchildren’s generation will be, absolutely I mean, if we’re not already dependent on Space Technology, they will be your cell phone operates because of satellites. And if you think about weather forecasting, or you think about disaster recovery and response, or you look at remote sensing, remote sensing through satellites and their sensors. That’s how we look at what’s going on the earth. That’s how we predict weather. That’s how we know, it influences a lot of national security policy. You know, it’s how you stay safe, it’s how you stay informed. And if you just blew up all the satellites out of the sky, we would be in a little bit of dark age, again, at least from what we’re used to.
William Nilson: If I may add, you talked about eating, I’m a fellow eater, I also eat and I enjoy it very much. But if I’m a startup, right, sometimes I’ve got to eat rice and beans, because I’m dealing with a lot of other stuff. And I’ve got to put everything I have into that startup. If I’m a space startup company, and I’m talking with you in an initial consultation, and I’ve got a great idea. But what am I looking at, you know, what’s the what’s the landscape? What am I going to face if I’ve got something involved in the space industry?
Bailey Reichelt: So, the first thing I’m going to tell you is, there’s a lot of regulations, and your technology is very important. But so are the regulations, because if you don’t have both, you’re not going to be successful. And a lot of people tell me, well, the regulation should change. And that’s great. And that’s good. But we have to deal with the laws as they are right now. And then we can talk about changing them later. But you’re gonna deal with US export controls. Export controls apply to everything. A lot of people don’t understand how all-consuming export controls can be in the US. So, look at your desk in front of you and pick up something off of it. If you were to send that overseas, we would ask, is that thing export controlled? Yeah, you’ve got the USB, that’s a more complicated one, but probably going to be EAR99. Unless you put some crazy stuff on it. EAR99 means that the thing can go anywhere, basically, without a license unless you want to ship it to Kim Jong Un, please don’t do that the government will still not let you do that.
William Nilson: That’s not the plan.
Bailey Reichelt: So yeah, stuff in front of you this pen, EAR99 would be its class, it, that’s where it would be on the Export Administration Regulations list. And you just can’t ship it to Kim Jong Un, that would be a restriction. But yeah, export controls cover a lot of ground and people think that they have to be making super important things and selling them to China before they kick in and that’s just not true. We also have this other concept called a Deemed Export that is unique to the US to some degree, a lot of European countries don’t have it, they’re very frustrated by this, too. It means that you can have an export here in the United States. A lot of people think that it’s just shipping physical stuff over international boundaries. It can also be a conversation you have with a Canadian engineer in the United States, your sister company in a foreign country could send some of their people and you’re having a meeting and you’re just talking about product development. And maybe some of the specifications a customer has asked you to design around. That can be an export, and it’s called a deemed export, because you’re deemed to have exported technology to their country, because you’re giving them the information which they will presumably take back. And that’s a pretty dramatic oversimplification, but I’m not here to explain export controls. That’s a general example of why companies get caught blindsided. When they’re like, oh, yeah, I did hire a Canadian, I didn’t think about that. I never asked him his nationality. He was here in grad school. And they get caught off guard by that. But other things that tend to be big surprises are that the Federal Communications Commission, which, if you want to talk to your thing in space, you’re going to be talking to the FCC, first. Because spectrum is a finite resource. And maybe this is more relatable in that, radio is part of the electromagnetic spectrum, there are not infinite radio channels, because they would interfere with each other. Well, it’s the same talking to your thing in space, and someone has to coordinate to prevent the interference to make sure you can actually talk to your thing. It’s all part of the electromagnetic spectrum, right? So, you’re going to need to talk to the FCC, and they’re going to coordinate with another international body, but first, they’re going to give you a license, that license can cost a lot of money. And it’s one of those few federal agencies, that does cost a lot of money. When you’re talking about the one space companies deal with hundreds of thousands of dollars. So, if you Will, had just started your company with your best friend from college, and you put everything you had into your prototype in your parent’s garage, you probably don’t have a half mil sitting around to pay attorneys to file a Schedule S or part 25 license for you for this constellation of satellites you envision, right?
William Nilson: That’s real I don’t. That’s a real example.
Bailey Reichelt: One of the first things I tell companies is hey, we need to talk about your raises and how much money you think you need to raise. Because you may need a lot more than that, once we factor in regulations. And then while you have the fee to apply, you also have recurring annual regulatory fees. And then you also have the cost of usually hiring an engineer to help you figure out which spectral allocation you need. Because the FCC is not gonna do that for you. And you might need someone like me to tell you which forms to fill out and help you fill them out. Because at the end of the day, I’m a very fancy form filler outer for the government, those expenses get really high. So those are two really, really big ones that people don’t think about that can blindside them.
Art Cavazos: When we’re thinking about you were saying the electromagnetic spectrum? Are we thinking about communications, their kind of data transfer, or what are those use for?
Bailey Reichelt: Sure, data transfer. Definitely. It’s up linking and downlinking.
Art Cavazos: Yeah, so that’s interesting. And also, you mentioned earlier, kind of space, being thought of as this playground for billionaires. But and then, I think very rightly pointed out a lot of the very important things that come out of space and practices that we implement here on Earth, that are learned, but also, you know, with the telecommunications aspect, I mean, that’s kind of what makes those satellites so important, right, to a large extent, they can also be used to take pictures, and you know, all that Google Earth and everything else. But a big part of it is kind of the internet communications, data transfer, being able to, you know, send signals, what you can control things remotely, etc. With all of that. So, I guess, with space being so important, how do you think it became thought of as this or I think I know why it’s thought of as the playground for billionaires, because so much of it is now owned by them, and a lot of the rockets and everything else, all that infrastructure is owned by billionaires. Is there a kind of a regulatory reason you think that that happened? Or is it budgetary reasons that the US just didn’t want to pay for that anymore, and private billionaires just started, you know, looking for some Moon beach property.
Bailey Reichelt: Well, it’s shifting, because it’s very, very, very expensive to play in space, right? Rockets are very expensive. Anything new and innovative is expensive. And I think you guys did have a question at one point, prior to us going on air about capital, and what would you tell someone regarding getting funding into space companies, and that I would say it’s hard because it’s capital intensive, up front. You’re gonna have a very long time before you get returned, your prototypes, gonna cost maybe a million dollars, right just to show people so you can get more money. And you’re gonna have a lot of people working for the hope of stock options because you can’t pay them a reasonable competitive salary. So, it’s very high risk. You have to have capital up front, you can’t expect returns on a normal venture timeline. A lot of investors look for that stereotypical hockey stick growth curve. It’s not a thing we see so much in space that exists more in the realm of tech and software. When you get into space hardware? You’re looking at much longer timelines for return, if any. So, it became the territory of private sector ultra-wealthy, because they’re the ones who had the money to invest capital upfront.
Art Cavazos: Yeah, no, I think that makes sense to me. I mean, billionaires are doing it, because they’re the only ones who can, they’re the only ones who have the capital, you know, other than national governments. And I think that has kind of just declined over the years, you know, over the decades, the amount of funding and kind of interests honestly, in space through the government funding.
William Nilson: Have you found that we’ve increasingly diversified? I mean, I think I know the answer to this question, it seems obvious to me, but that we’ve increasingly diversified in terms of the origin of companies that are entering the space realm, in terms of where they’re located in the world, or has that started to concentrate more in your practice?
Bailey Reichelt: You think most companies still see the US as the place you go, if you want to enter the space realm, we see a lot of foreign companies establish a footprint in the US just a play in the US market, there’s still a lot of government money to be had to play in the space market in the US. And a lot of it goes through government or DOD accelerator programs. The Defense Department actually runs many small business accelerators. And the Small Business Administration puts a lot of funding into innovation and research programs and partnering with universities, those programs are probably much bigger, and the pot of money is much bigger in the US than I dare say, I’m totally speculating, but I daresay anywhere else in the world. So, it’s still very much a free market, people still have that American Dream that they’re going to come here, and they’re going to do the thing no one else did. And they’re going to make it. It’s alive and well, and foreign companies are still coming here in droves.
William Nilson: I’m glad I asked because I thought and maybe this is just my perception based on, you know, recent rover activity in India entering kind of a new realm of space travel that they had not entered yet, at least as far as I, as I know, that I considered potentially that it was becoming more world diversified, which may be, you know, with foreign companies coming to the US for the reasons you stated, that is kind of an example of some diversification, at least of thought and of origin. But it sounds like the US is still in many ways, a haven or a good growth bed, if you will, of space companies. That’s exciting, to be around that is exciting, I would say.
Bailey Reichelt: Yeah. So, asking, I think the half of that question I didn’t answer is are space companies like flocking to India because of India’s recent success with their space program? And the answer to that is, I don’t know. But I can give you a little bit of perspective on what you can expect if you’re a US company, US owned and operated. And this is where we go back to export control. US export controls are extra-territorial for US companies, meaning they follow you around the world, wherever you may go. So, you you’re a US person, you don’t get to abandon US export controls just because you go abroad. That being said, much space technology, highly export controlled. And you have to ask the government’s permission if you want to share it with a foreign country, or even work on control technology in a foreign country. Because under the International Traffic and Arms Regulations, we have this concept called defense service. So that’s you know how when you go and apply it to a foreign company who’s building a rocket could require that you ask the government for permission. And that, in and of itself is a huge barrier to US companies going elsewhere in the world.
Art Cavazos: Yeah. And that’s something I know I definitely didn’t think about much is when you’re dealing with rockets, and heavy fuels and things like that. You’re dealing so closely with arms regulation, and kind of international laws around that. Is there anything you can speak to kind of on that topic?
Bailey Reichelt: Yeah, there’s this thing called the Missile Technology Control Regime, right, when we get into international treaties and things like that, there’s also the MTCR, which is not normally associated with space, but it influences things in space all time, so how that translates to the US is we took anything that we considered technology listed in the MTCR, which is missile technology, rockets or giant missiles, they’re ICBMs, right? Or they can be with a few tweaks, all those things and all the parts and the technology that goes into this. We highly, highly control and we have this big agreement saying that we’re going to lock that down for nuclear weapons proliferation reasons. So, it’s very unlikely You’re gonna be able to ship a rocket to a foreign country without the governments, significant involvement and blessing in that transaction.
Art Cavazos: And how difficult is that is there a lot of complication introduced by that?
Bailey Reichelt: So you’ll either need something called a foreign military sale, which, if you have enough insider connections, or maybe a lobbying power, maybe you can initiate those on your own, it’s getting a little bit outside of my subject matter expertise here, generally, the government of another country will come to the US government, and say, I’d like to buy this thing. And then the US government will kick off that process, and they kind of shepherd the whole transaction. There’s one other way to do some of this business a little bit more easily. It’s called a technology safeguards agreement. It’s an international treaty. So, it does have to be facilitated by the State Department. And it can be between two countries, there’s one in place between the US and New Zealand. And what that says is that with certain agreement that that foreign country will adhere and uphold to US export controls for Non-Proliferation, we will agree to send you things we would not otherwise send you. And we will share technology with you that we would not otherwise share with you. But a TSA takes a long time to get in place. And it does require a relatively sophisticated Export Control Program, when the US considers adequate on the other side. And again, it’s negotiated by the State Department. So, it’s not really something a small company could just be like, I really want to sell rockets to Austria, so I’m going to initiate a TSA. That’s not something you can do.
Art Cavazos: What does a startup a space startup look like here in the US? So not focusing obviously on export of rockets. But to what are they focused on and kind of what are some things you see space startups doing these days?
Bailey Reichelt: Oh, most space startups are focused on satellites, which are much easier to work internationally on. Barring they, you know, don’t have weaponized lasers that can melt other satellites and things like that. But satellites in general are easier than rockets, because you can’t make them into giant missiles. But yeah, satellites are generally what space startups are working on, but also ground station, more innovative ways. Optical communication. So, talking to satellite with lasers, having satellites talk to each other with lasers. There’s a lot of component development for that Orbital Transfer Vehicles, which is a type of spacecraft that can go on orbit and refuel other spacecraft, or I think the term is lifecycle management, it can alter their inclination to keep them from falling into a graveyard orbit, or it could send them into a graveyard orbit. There’s lots of different purposes for those. So, there’s a lot of companies working on orbital transfer vehicles right now.
William Nilson: Bailey, when do you plan to go to space?
Bailey Reichelt: I already told you that I didn’t start out wanting to be an astronaut. Maybe my daughter wants to be that, or my husband absolutely would leave me to go to space. I’ll give you, my ticket. That’s my answer. I actually really like it right here.
William Nilson: Have you found startups coming up with a lot of ideas about like, low orbit space travel? And has that been? You know, I know we have current billionaire examples of that. But have there been a lot of ideas about making that more accessible.
Bailey Reichelt: There’s actually competitions springing up now is like PR grabs and fundraisers to win a ticket to orbit. And you’ve seen that a little bit with the bigger companies, but it’s popping up with like, nonprofit then we think we’re going to have a movie with Tom Cruise on the ISS, and it’s becoming more accessible. For sure. I’ve seen it definitely outside the major space players and in the smaller companies. I don’t know where it’s going. It’s interesting.
William Nilson: Well, my wife will never go to space. She’s told me very clearly, multiple occasions, she will never go to space. So it will be a lonely trip if I ended up ever having an opportunity to do that.
Bailey Reichelt: Yeah, I mean, it’s pretty inhospitable. I mean, my swimming pool on earth is gonna look a lot better than the swimming pool on Mars. Just saying. A lot of people are gonna come after me for alleging there’s water or something on Mars.
William Nilson: Right, right.
Art Cavazos: So sometimes we like to ask our guests before we wrap up. What are you doing to make your own business future ready?
Bailey Reichelt: Oh, yeah, that’s really hard being a law firm because we are mostly all antiquated. Just kidding. We’re not because we’re doing this podcast.
Art Cavazos: Yeah, but Will makes his own clothes. So, you know, It’s a mixed bag.
Bailey Reichelt: I have more questions, but I’ll stick to the topic right now.
William Nilson: Different podcasts.
Bailey Reichelt: So, cybersecurity has been a big topic for us. If you read your malpractice insurance policies. There’s a myriad of things they give you when you when you apply for those. One of their selling points is telling you how often hackers target law firms, because law firms tend to be so behind and inadequate in their cybersecurity. So, realizing that and also the nature of the sensitive data, but controlled unclassified information and export-controlled information that law firms are often asked to handle. That’s been very important. And as far as other innovations, we try to operate a lot like the startups we serve in staying agile, and very flexible. We try to think about ourselves as a business. And we tried to make the value our business and not you know, like Bailey, I don’t want the value of what we do tied to me. And in order to do that, we basically started writing down everything and trying to create templates and efficiencies and ways to take this knowledge we’re gaining from working with our startups and working with regulators and documenting it so that we can hand it to other people. And it’s not just lost in our brains forever. I think that’s something a lot of law firms overlook is we have to make the value, like we have to put the value out there some as some tangible thing and not just leave it in the brains of individual humans.
So that’s one of the ways we’ve been leaning in. And probably the last way is our pricing model, we stay far away from hourly billing, if possible. Because for startups, it’s really important to have a predictable set of expenses and predictable operating budget. So if we can make things more predictable for them, and we can open ourselves up to be more available to prevent problems rather than talk about them on the back end after they’ve already happened. Like because we don’t do litigations That’s too late for us. If we can do that, then we’re really doing a greater service to our clients and the industry. And I think it makes us again, more agile, and more innovative in how we are forced to work with our clients.
William Nilson: Yeah, this is great. I love hearing this. I can’t wait to talk with you more about that. I’m very interested in that topic specifically.
Art Cavazos: Yeah, definitely. We’d love it if you can make it back for another episode sometime.
Bailey Reichelt: Talk about the art of running a small business.
Art Cavazos: No pun intended.
William Nilson: It’s a beautiful Art.
Art Cavazos: All right. Well, unfortunately, that’s all the time we have for today. So, thank you, everyone, for joining us on this episode of future ready business. We touched on a lot of things today regarding Extra Terrestrial business opportunities out of this world. And I hope Bailey will join us again soon. In the meantime, Bailey, where can folks find you on the internet?
Bailey Reichelt: You can type in my hard to spell name on LinkedIn, I will be there. Or you can go to Aegis.law. A-e–g-i-s, just like the Greek shield.
Art Cavazos: Bailey Reichelt.
Bailey Reichelt: Bailey Reichelt, you got it.
Art Cavazos: Got it. All right.
William Nilson: Nicely done Art.
Art Cavazos: And Will, where can folks find you on the internet?
William Nilson: Well, you can always look at my Jackson Walker bio. That’s a good source for my legal profession. But you can also find me on socials on Instagram. I’m Austin Bespoke Fits. That’s my, that’s my side company for clothing. But I’m rebranding now so find me and then it’ll, it’ll pop. It’ll be good.
Art Cavazos: Yeah, Will not only makes his own clothes, he makes clothes for others as well. So, if you’d like the show, please rate and review us wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts. Share FRB with your friends and colleagues. You can find us on Instagram and Threads @FutureReadyBusiness and you can find me on Twitter and TikTok @FinanceLawyer. As mentioned at the top of the show, the opinions expressed today do not necessarily reflect the views of Jackson Walker, its clients or any of their respective affiliates. This podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. We hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for listening.
William Nilson: Thanks, Bailey.
Art Cavazos: Thanks all.
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This podcast is made available by Jackson Walker for informational purposes only, does not constitute legal advice, and is not a substitute for legal advice from qualified counsel. Your use of this podcast does not create an attorney-client relationship between you and Jackson Walker. The facts and results of each case will vary, and no particular result can be guaranteed.
