Our vision for space is one in which there is a healthy and vibrant interplanetary economy between the various planets and space entities. We also envision space-specific content, but we are not prepared to share specific plans at the moment.
I would also refer to our earlier response regarding space development:
https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/forums/showthread.php?308683-When-will-Space-be-fixed
This sounds like you agree with the second picture, which i find encouraging.
Things to keep in mind if you want to get to this 'what could be' scenario:
You need weight restrictions and item count restrictions for all forms of transport (sleipnir, quad, equus, privateer,mothership,auction).
You need to have higher costs eg much more fuelburn/non-warp capable for ships that exceed weight/itemcount limitations.
You need longer travel distances between planets and more options to travel at different speeds for a higher price.
Warp needs to stop being an close to instant thing.
Interceptors should never be cargoships.
Stacking of (antigrav)containers inside one another to bypass itemcount and or weightrestrictions, needs to be impossible - if you want people to carry 5000 items in containers then you need to create such container, if you want them to carry a million kg without being encumbered you need to offer this type of container (dont indirectly allow it by stacking 20 lux luggages inside one another).
Logging off while on transport ships can not be a method of bypassing weight/itemcount restrictions nor should it allow to bypass lootable pvp and gain an advantage in the game by not 'playing'.
You need a form of universal orders in the auction system - eg create transport missions automatically at space stations that match local planetary orders - that way pilots could deliver orders on one planet by getting ressources from another.
Suddendly players in the whole universe could make their orders locally and get delivered what they need without having to switch planets themself (nor would they carry the risk).
Balance pvp risk in space by making fuel partially lootable or introducing another type of fuel for higher traveling speed - this would force 'pirates' to carry a risk (fuel) to reach the speed to hunt cargo ships and therefor making themself a lucrative target to those cargo ships or a new profession of space 'police'/'bountyhunters'/'security service'.
Create interplanetary dependencies - crafting blueprints that need components from multiple planets for example to create special high energy 'fuels', or modules for spacecrafts(faster subwarp drives, better energy shields, torpedos, mines, special ammo),etc.
Create competition - allow ships to tier up or enhance their modules to specialize in more cargo capacity, faster traveling speeds, more shields, etc. customizable ships drive economic growth as players will try to adjust and be better at what they do.
Add space mining and enhance risk in space (more mobs, more danger, more aggro, more to adjust to, more to keep existing ships busy) - this will keep more players occupied as they get spread out more and not all compete over the same ressource - then you can introduce more ships, options to finetune the overall economy over time.
Essentially there is lots of things that need to happen to get to the second picture, but its doable if you get started - it wont happen by waiting for it or just adding a single blueprint somewhere - the loopholes need to be closed first.