Space Exploration gets rocket license

Space Exploration Technologies Corp., a start-up seeking to slash the cost of coursing through the cosmos, has been granted a five-year license to launch rockets from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, the Air Force said.

The approval could help El Segundo-based SpaceX, as the privately held company is known, compete with Orbital Sciences Corp., which develops small space systems, and later with the bigger rockets of Europe’s Arianspace and the United Launch Alliance.

The latter is a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp. and Boeing Co., the Pentagon’s No. 1 and No. 2 suppliers.