Crossing the Valley · 2026-07-08 · 53 min
About Ryan Westerdahl Before starting Turion, Ryan spent nine years as an engineer at SpaceX, joining not long after the company’s sixth flight and working under Kevin Wu - an engineering leader Ryan credits as one of the best of his generation (now leads engineering at Relativity Space). Ryan’s interest in space dates back to 2002, when he first saw an NPR segment about the discovery of exoplanets that set him on his life mission. About Turion Space Turion Space is a space technology company built around a long-term vision: extracting economic value from space beyond satellite communications - ultimately, asteroid mining. Rather than raising all of the (massive) capital that vision would require up front, Turion is executing what it calls the “Starforge” strategy: decomposing that future architecture into discrete, scalable business portfolios - tactical space, space logistics, geospatial/ISR, and an underlying mission software and ground-operations stack (branded Starfire OS) - each capable of generating revenue and proving technology on its own timeline.
