[[Home|🏠]] <span style="color: LightSlateGray">></span> [[Interviews]] <span style="color: LightSlateGray">></span> 2025-05-19 **Insider**: [[Peter Beck]] **Source**: [Markets with Madison](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqVqj1lmQzQ) **Date**: 2025-05-19  🔗 Backup Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqVqj1lmQzQ ## 🎙️ Transcript ### Quick-Fire Questions (00:00) **Madison:** I'm just keen to start rolling these quick-fire questions with execs. Starting with you - there's going to be a little bit rough and ready and raw. What do you think is the biggest problem in the world right now, and then perhaps in the next 5 years? **Peter Beck:** I mean, I'm 100% focused and dedicated to this business. I don't think about much of the world, to my own fault. I think if you talk to my wife or anybody around me, I'm largely completely ignorant to the rest of the world events unless it has to do with Rocket Lab. It really doesn't get much attention. So I'm not sure that's really the answer you wanted, but... ### Artificial Intelligence and AGI (00:40) **Madison:** Well, this kind of forfeits my next question, but I was going to ask you about artificial general intelligence. Do you think about it? Do you care? And when do you think it could perhaps be achieved, by who, and what impact on the world could it have? **Peter Beck:** Well, I mean, I can't wait. We have a very strong adoption of AI within Rocket Lab, and we have people dedicated - that is their job - to push AI into as many places of business as possible. I think it's a huge productivity tool, and we see it deployed in Rocket Lab all the time. There was an engineer I talked to just recently who developed a whole GUI for an engine test, and everybody knows that I'm super hot on AI. So they were very proud to say it was all built with AI and they did it in an afternoon. That sort of thing would have taken weeks worth of programming in native languages to achieve what we needed to achieve, and it was just smashed out. So I think it's super good. There'll be some challenges and there'll be some things that are less good along the way, but I think it's the natural evolution of us. **Madison:** Do you think the efficiency gains and the productivity that we can utilize from it outweigh any of the risks? **Peter Beck:** Well, I mean, nobody's going to stop it anyway. So it's kind of an academic question. Nobody's just going to magically stop. So embrace it. ### Daily Routine and Work-Life Balance (01:56) **Madison:** We were joking about your routine before we rolled the cameras. Do you have one? What's like the morning method for Peter Beck, or like a wind-down routine? **Peter Beck:** Not really, no. The day starts pretty early, and then obviously with the US we get synced pretty early. Then I always try and be home for dinner with the kids, and then they're off to bed and then I go back to work. That's kind of the closest to a routine. But I'm traveling all the time and blasting around the world. To be honest with you, I don't have a certain routine. I'm not like super routine. It's bizarre - you'd think I would because I need all my knives and forks perfectly laid up in order. **Madison:** We can tell by looking at your factory. **Peter Beck:** Exactly! But I'm not one for rigidized routines. I like a bit of chaos. The best day for me is to come in and it's just all over the show - I'm running around all over the places because I get to do lots of interesting and different things. I reckon life would be super boring if you had this really regimented routine. I never want to be the CEO of a company that is like "this is your meeting on Mondays and this is what happens at Monday 1:00." That would be boring. **Madison:** Thrive in chaos? **Peter Beck:** Yeah. ### Reading Habits (03:20) Madison:** Do you read books, and if so, what's a favorite? **Peter Beck:** Not really. I mean, I read technical volumes. Not really into... fiction is exactly that - fiction. So no, you got enough on your plate. If it's relevant to some things that we're into, then I'll pick up some technical volumes, but not sit on the beach and read some kind of self-help book. **Madison:** Unless it's at Mahia and you're watching a rocket fly or something, then it's worthwhile. **Peter Beck:** If I'm at Mahia, then I'm most likely in mission control. You've got a headset on. ### Starting Out in Today's Space Industry (03:58) **Madison:** If you were starting out again today, what would you do and how would you do it? Peter Beck: For Rocket Lab or just general in life? Madison: Would it be rockets, would it be space? Where do you think that market is now? So far gone if somebody was starting out now in 2025? **Peter Beck:** No, no. I think there's a huge opportunity if someone was starting in the space industry right now. I think it's way easier to start in the space industry now than when I started the space industry. Tremendous pools of capital available, tremendous proof points that businesses can be commercial. We've got public companies now that have graduated from VC all the way through to public. So no, I think now is a super good time. **Madison:** Awesome. Thank you so much. Peter Beck: Easy