Australia enters the space race

This seems like a very complicated idea to me, but it's definitely interesting.

"You’ve already got to be going at hypersonic speed before a scramjet works but, once you get there, it’s by far the most efficient type of engine.”

To reach these hypersonic speeds, Smart plans to combine an uncrewed scramjet with conventional rockets. He believes his Spartan launch system could radically reduce the costs of blasting satellites into orbit. “All conventional satellite launch systems use different stages,” says Smart. “There’ll be a first stage rocket that normally gets up to Mach 5 or 6, you’ll have a second scramjet stage that goes two thirds of the way to space and you’ll have a final upper stage that takes the satellite into orbit.”

On the launchpad, Spartan will look and launch like a conventional rocket. Once it reaches hypersonic speeds, however, the first stage will drop away and the scramjet will unfurl its wings to blast the spacecraft into the upper atmosphere. When it runs out of air, the scramjet will separate and a small conventional rocket will carry the satellite into space. The only part of the launch system that will not survive the flight is the final third stage, which will burn up in the atmosphere after releasing its payload into orbit.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20161117-australias-hypersonic-spaceplane-for-a-new-space-race