Orion Interstellar

Overview
Orion Interstellar is a prominent manufacturer of FTL drives, Power Cores, Engines, and other navigation-related starship technologies. was founded in 2071 by George Jackson, an intelligent astrophysicist and very skilled FTL drive developer. After attaining a small fortune from developing the FTL drive alongside his long-time friend, Raphael Schanz, Jackson spent some time living a peaceful life before deciding to open up Orion Interstellar and begin developing spacecraft and more advanced technologies. A list of products and technologies can be found further below.

Products
Below is a list of products developed by Orion Interstellar.

FTL Drives
There are four different types of drive that Orion Interstellar produces:


 * 1) Commercial Drives
 * 2) Capital-Class Drives (Distinguished by a -C suffix)
 * 3) Experimental Drives (Distinguished by a -E suffix)
 * 4) Galactic Drives (Distinguished by a -G suffix)

Below is a list of each drive and the purpose it serves.

Commercial Drives
Commercial Drives are the most common type of FTL drive. They are small, compact, and used exclusively on personal vessels. These drives, while self-sufficient, are typically on the slower end, with the fastest Commercial Drive having a top speed of only 2.5 ly/s. These drives are the least expensive, of course, being small, compact, and widely used by the typical consumer.

Capital-Class Drives
Capital-Class Drives are used exclusively on (you guessed it) capital-class ships. These drives are typically large and quite expensive compared to Commercial Drives. These drives are quite fast, with top speeds ranging between 5 ly/s all the way up to 20 ly/s (though this is only in rare cases that speeds reach this insane level). These drives, being so large, require an exponentially higher amount of energy to operate, and therefore a capital ship jumping into/dropping out of FTL is a much more spectacular spectacle than your average Commercial Drive engaging/disengaging would be.

Experimental Drives
Experimental Drives are, as their name suggests, experimental, and therefore speeds, efficiency, and other factors and statistics such as cost vary heavily. These drives are almost never used on vessels that are actually put into operation, due to their unpredictability and unreliability. These drives are the second-fastest, with the fastest Experimental Drive capable of speeds up to 50 ly/s consistently.

Galactic Drives
Galactic Drives are the fastest drives you can possibly get and are capable of propelling a ship between galaxies reliably and consistently. Of course, there comes the side-effect of an extremely high cost, ranging in the tens to hundreds of billions of credits each. These drives use such a high amount of energy that a singular ship is completely incapable of producing enough to even engage- instead, Galactic Drives utilize Jump Gates in order to get the energy they need to start up. This means, however, that a Galactic Drive only works in specific places, these places being where Jump Gates are.

Engines
Orion Interstellar doesn't just produce FTL drives, it also produces general purpose engines for use in normal-space.

Fusion Engines
Fusion Engines utilize hydrogen fusion in order to produce thrust. They're most common on combat ships, mining vessels, and other ships that usually operate in a relatively small area and never travel very far. Fusion Engines have a very high thrust-to-fuel ratio, meaning that they burn through a ton of hydrogen fuel but produce huge amounts of thrust, which is useful for quick maneuvering in the battlefield.

Ion Engines
Ion Engines are high-efficiency engines that will efficiently eject ions and spent hydrogen fuel from a ship's Fusion Core in order to produce thrust. These are most common among exploration vessels, which will typically need efficient engines for long burns, such as a burn to circularize an orbit. These engines are near-useless for quick maneuvering, however, and are never used on combat ships.

Combustion Engines
Combustion Engines use the combustion of flammable liquid fuel in order to produce thrust. They're most commonly used on small, personal vessels, and are good for general-purpose operations. They're nearly never put onto capital-class ships, however, and remain the #1 most popular choice for use on personal starships.

Power Cores
Orion Interstellar also manufactures Power Cores for use on capital-class ships.

Fusion Cores
Fusion Cores are the most common type of Power Core. They utilize a wide range of fusion types (usually hydrogen or deuterium fusion) in order to produce large amounts of energy in order to power a capital-class ship. These are the most sustainable type of core, as well as the most efficient, but other cores do see notable use in operation. Note: a Fusion Core is required for the operation of an Ion Engine.

Fission Cores
Fission Cores use nuclear fission of heavy elements, such as uranium, in order to produce power. These cores are the second most common, but only make up about 1% of use in the field. They're cheap, of course, but very dirty and inefficient compared to Fusion Cores. Most Fission Cores see use in the early stages of planetary bases and colonies or as a backup power source on large ships.

Warp Cores
Warp Cores produce the most amount of power, but are the most dangerous and are considered "exotic." These cores use technology similar to FTL drives in order to create power. These incredibly complex machines use an extremely dense, artificial matter known as protomatter in their reaction chambers. The Warp Core will then create distortions in spacetime in a controlled area inside the reaction chamber; this causes the protomatter to violently and energetically react, producing ungodly amounts of energy. As stated before, however, these cores are incredibly dangerous if operated incorrectly.

History
Orion Interstellar was founded on August 3rd, 2071, by a brilliant astrophysicist and FTL drive developer named George Jackson. The company was an almost immediate success, with sales already very high in the FTL drive industry. With so much profit on his hands, George Jackson immediately worked towards expanding Orion's boundaries, funding colonization projects and putting many orbital outposts and starports around the Solar System, and, of course, in many other star systems near the Solar System.

After this rapid expansion phase was over, Orion Interstellar began to focus more on R&D over overall expansion. More technologies were developed, including new Engines, Power Cores, and FTL drives. This also led to the creation of many research stations, such LSO-1.

This R&D phase of its existence led to the development of Galactic Drives, which are sold exclusively by Orion Interstellar- no other corporation has been able to figure out how to produce them. The creation of the Galactic Drive also brought upon Jump Gates and other technologies related to intergalactic travel. This led to a huge boom in Orion's profits.

After this intergalactic tech boom phase, FTL drive development reached its theoretical limit; advancement stagnated, and, of course, every FTL drive producing company sort of fell into a neutral state where they do not get worse or get any better. This is considered today's current state in the year 2117.