SpaceX launched the Dragon spacecraft on their eighth operational cargo delivery mission to the International Space Station. Among the cargo was the Bigelow Aerospace’s BEAM module, which was attached to the station and will stay so for 2 years. BEAM is an expandable habitat module that will undergo tests to determine its worthiness during the stay. The flight was conducted under the Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA.

The Full Thrust variants first stage includes all systems necessary for an operational re-use of stages while the second stage is operated as an expendable rocket stage.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp., known as SpaceX, is an American aerospace manufacturer and space transport services company headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by entrepreneur Elon Musk with the goal of reducing space transportation costs and enabling the colonization of Mars. SpaceX operates from many pads, on the East Coast of the US they operate from SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and historic LC-39A at Kennedy Space Center. They also operate from SLC-4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base, California, usually for polar launches. Another launch site is being developed at Boca Chica, Texas.

• Commercial Resupply Services

  Human Spaceflight
  Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) are a series of flights awarded by NASA for the delivery of cargo and supplies to the International Space Station.The first CRS contracts were signed in 2008 and awarded $1.6 billion to SpaceX for twelve cargo Dragon and $1.9 billion to Orbital Sciences for eight Cygnus flights, covering deliveries to 2016. The Falcon 9 and Antares rockets were also developed under the CRS program to deliver cargo spacecraft to the ISS.
  Program wiki
• International Space Station

  Human Spaceflight
  The International Space Station programme is tied together by a complex set of legal, political and financial agreements between the sixteen nations involved in the project, governing ownership of the various components, rights to crewing and utilization, and responsibilities for crew rotation and resupply of the International Space Station. It was conceived in 1984 by President Ronald Reagan, during the Space Station Freedom project as it was originally called.
  Program infoProgram wiki