In the space sector, there is now SpaceX and the others. The Californian group ended 2022 with 61 launches on the clock, a historic performance, twice its 2021 record (31 launches). The competition? She appears more than ever dropped. Arianespace only carried out 5 launches, including three Ariane 5 and two Vega-C (the last ending in failure on December 20). ULA, the joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, carried out 8 launches, including 1 of Delta IV and 7 of Atlas 5. Only Chinese players roughly support the comparison with Elon Musk’s group: they carried out 61 launches in 2022, including fifty with the Long March range of launchers.
Will 2023 be the same? True to its principles, SpaceX continues to accelerate flat out: the group anticipates a hundred launches, the first of which was carried out on January 3, with 114 satellites on board. The novelty is that the pack is now on his trail. If the deadlines are met, 2023 should see an impressive series of inaugural flights of new heavy launchers. The first launch of ULA’s Vulcan Centaur, which will replace the Delta IV and Atlas 5 rockets, is scheduled before the end of March 2023. The maiden flight of Ariane 6, eagerly awaited by a Europe which no longer has an available launcher, is announced in the last trimester. Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos’ space group, is also preparing the first flight of its New Glenn heavy launch vehicle. This is planned for 2023-2024. On the lower segment, there is also a traffic jam, with the first planned flights of the Japanese H3 (Mitsubishi), of the Terran 1 Relativity Space mini-launcher, and that, already carried out (and a failure as a result) of the RS1 launcher from the American ABL.
Virtual monopoly of SpaceX
This frenzy of new launchers, particularly in the heavy segment, owes nothing to chance. “All these projects are a response to the rise of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 since 2012-2013, which is now in a position of virtual monopoly, summarizes Maxime Puteaux, consultant associated with Euroconsult, a space specialist. These programs have all experienced developmental delays, which explains why they arrive at around the same time.”
The arrival of these new players is good news for satellite operators. They are hardly satisfied with the de facto monopoly of SpaceX which, with the Starlink telecoms constellation, has also become one of their competitors. “Access to space is extremely important for Eutelsat, so we try to have multiple launch suppliers, underlined the general manager of Eutelsat, Eva Berneke, during the Paris Air Forum last June. ‘a competitive market.’
We will still have to wait a little longer for this competition to materialize. First, new delays, in particular on Ariane 6 and New Glenn, are not excluded. Inaugural flights could slip to 2024, or even later for New Glenn. Above all, the increase in production rates, and therefore launches, will not happen in a few weeks. “By the time new launchers reach their target rate, the shortage of launch supply is likely to persist until 2025-2026,” said Maxime Puteaux.
2,500 satellites to be launched per year
And then? The arrival on the market of several high-capacity launchers could completely reverse the situation. “We could go, at the end of the decade, from a situation of shortage of available launchers to an excess of supply”, underlines Maxime Puteaux. Certainly, in a report published last December, Euroconsult predicts that an average of 2,500 satellites will be launched each year over the period 2022-2031, a theoretical market of 111 billion dollars for launch companies. But two-thirds of these launches would be for the benefit of the major telecom constellations (Starlink, Amazon Kuiper, OneWeb, the Chinese GuoWang, etc.), and therefore not necessarily open to competition.
Why? Because vertically integrated players, ie those who have launchers and manufacture their own satellites, will probably launch their own satellites. SpaceX will launch its Starlinks, China will do the same for its constellations. Amazon could also be tempted to favor New Glenn from Blue Origin, another company in the Bezos galaxy, to put its Kuiper satellites into orbit.
The economic equation of the new launchers will be all the more complex as SpaceX, already dominant with Falcon 9, is already preparing the next stage, with its giant Starship/Super Heavy launcher. This monumental and 100% reusable launcher, with a payload of 21 tons in geostationary orbit and 100 tons in low orbit, is in the test phase on the Texas site of SpaceX, in Boca Chica. It will be able to meet, assures Elon Musk, all launch needs. Calibrated for space exploration, it has already been selected by NASA as the lander that will allow astronauts to set foot on lunar soil again by 2025 (Artemis program). It is also optimized to launch the second generation of Starlink satellites. Starship will also launch conventional telecom satellites. A first contract of this type was signed in August 2022 with the Japanese operator SkyPerfect JSAT, which will launch its Superbird-9 satellite on Starship in 2024.
Full order books
What siphon off the market, and pull the rug out from under the competition? Not necessarily. For the moment, the new launchers that are going to attack SpaceX have a full order book. ULA’s Vulcan Centaur claims more than 70 launches to complete, including 38 for Amazon’s Kuiper constellation. Ariane 6 has 29 shots to perform, including 18 for Kuiper. New Glenn (Blue Origin) also has its work cut out for it: Amazon has entrusted it with 12 launches for Kuiper, plus 15 as options, in addition to contracts already signed (Eutelsat, Sky Perfect JSAT, etc.). The priority for SpaceX’s pack of competitors is clearly to launch on time, more than to sign new contracts.
.