Mach 1, Dawn Rises, with Stefan Powell (CEO of Dawn Aerospace)

This week on Pathfinder, we’re ready to kick off 2025 with our first episode back from a brief holiday hiatus. Joining us is Stefan Powell, co-founder and CEO of Dawn Aerospace—a company focused on building scalable, sustainable space transportation solutions. After cutting their teeth with an in-space propulsion business, Dawn is now pushing the boundaries with Aurora, a rocket-powered plane that recently breaking the sound barrier (or Mach 1).

In this episode, we explore:
– From Student Rocket Club to Thriving Venture: Stefan’s background and how his early rocketry experiences shaped Dawn’s mission.
– Satellite Propulsion: Why Dawn’s safer, scalable alternatives to traditional satellite fuel are gaining traction in the market—and how they enable near-term revenue.
*–Aurora’s Breakthrough Flight: Hitting Mach 1.1, testing supersonic aerodynamics, and the path toward suborbital flight capabilities.
– Hypersonics & Beyond: Why government R&D and military programs are pouring billions into hypersonics research—and how Dawn plans to help solve the “access-to-test-time” gap.
– Aircraft-Like Space Access: Dawn’s long-term vision for truly rapid, reusable, runway-based vehicles that could revolutionize launch operations.
– Building for the Future, One Step at a Time: How Stefan thinks about scaling, capital efficiency, and bridging near-term commercial opportunities with an ambitious roadmap.

…and much, more.

• Chapters •
00:00:00 - Intro
00:01:45 - Founding Dawn
00:06:33 - Core products
00:08:52 - Sustainability
00:11:25 - How Stefan got into the space industry
00:16:20 - What Stefan is developing with Aurora
00:19:09 - Recent flight
00:20:38 - Why is it important to go past Mach 1?
00:24:02 - Technical milestones before full orbital capabilities
00:26:43 - Hypersonics and building commercial ability
00:30:23 - Government customers
00:31:39 - Opportunities in hypersonic weapons?
00:33:02 - Payload capacity of first commercial launch vehicle
00:33:58 - Long-term scaling goals
00:37:15 - What is so difficult about building commercial hypersonic platforms?
00:42:05 - Most significant hurdles when it comes to scaling and manufacturing
00:44:32 - Building in New Zealand
00:46:38 - Revenue mix
00:48:15 - Capital efficiency
00:51:47 - Effect of Starship on the launch market
00:53:42 - What does success look like for Dawn over the next 10 years
00:56:25 - What Stefan has learned about being a CEO/Founder for 15 years
00:58:11 - Everything's on the table

• Show notes •
Dawn’s website — https://www.dawnaerospace.com/
Dawn’s socials — https://x.com/DawnAerospace
Stefan’s socials — https://x.com/Stefan__Powell
Mo's socials —   / itsmoislam  
Payload’s socials —   / payloadspace   /   / payloadspace  
Pathfinder archive — Watch:    / @payloadspace  
Pathfinder archive — Listen: https://pod.payloadspace.com/episodes

• About us •
Pathfinder is brought to you by Payload, a modern space media brand built from the ground up for a new age of space exploration and commercialization. We deliver need-to-know news and insights daily to 19,000+ commercial, civil, and military space leaders. Payload is read by decision-makers at every leading new space company, along with c-suite leaders at all of the aerospace & defense primes. We’re also read on Capitol Hill, in the Pentagon, and at space agencies around the world.

Payload began as a weekly email sent to a few friends and coworkers. Today, we’re a team distributed across four time zones and two continents, publishing five media properties across multiple platforms:

1) Payload, our flagship daily newsletter, sends M-F @ 9am Eastern
2) Pathfinder publishes weekly on Tuesday mornings (pod.payloadspace.com)
3) Polaris, our weekly policy briefing, publishes weekly on Tuesdays
4) Payload Research, our weekly research and analysis piece, comes out on Wednesdays

You can sign up for all of our publications here: https://payloadspace.com/subscribe/