Welcome to Edition 9.02 of the Rocket Report! Our attention in the coming days turns to Asia, where there are a couple of notable rocket debuts. Up first is the Long March 10B on Friday, a medium-lift rocket with a reusable first stage. After launch this stage will attempt a landing on a recovery ship. Then, as early as Sunday, the private Indian company Skyroot may attempt to launch its first rocket, Vikram-1.
Several customers of those rideshare missions have previously said SpaceX is not accepting Transporter reservations beyond late 2028 or early 2029. Now a competitor, Rocket Lab, says it has heard the same from its customers.
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He said he expects SpaceX to focus Falcon 9 more on its own internal customers, including Starlink and its future orbital data center system.
This is completely bizarre behavior from SpaceX. Where is the capacity constraint that SpaceX would need to abandon this line of business? Reuse of F9 cores means that likely isn’t it. An F9 second stage is consumed with each launch but with the reduction of F9 cores that would suggest they have plenty of extra capacity to produce more second stages as they share the same production lines and engines (obviously MVAC is slightly different engine).
If SpaceX is redirecting their F9 capacity for internal consumption then perhaps the plans they had with Starship timelines aren’t going well.
The one bright spot of this announcement is it allows other launch competitors to fill this space. Rideshare customers can’t be too picky because they are so cost conscious. As long as another launch provider can get close to the SpaceX price for rideshare payloads then this will mean a nice revenue stream for another launch provider. Rocketlab Neutron is looking even more attractive with this SpaceX announcement.
The rideshares are a nightmare. Dealing with that many clowns in one place does not seem worth it. I could see someone like Exolaunch booking launches and running the rideshares. They’ve done so before.
Where is the capacity constraint that SpaceX would need to abandon this line of business?
I was about to say “launch pads and drone ships”, since they’ve taken LC-39A and JRTI offline, but then remembered that Transporter missions launch out of SLC-4E, which is on the west coast, so it can’t be that.
the reduction of F9 cores that would suggest they have plenty of extra capacity to produce more second stages
We know from their 2025 launch cadence that they can churn out second stages at an absolutely insane rate, so it’s probably not that either.
he expects SpaceX to focus Falcon 9 more on its own internal customers, including Starlink and its future orbital data center system
I’m not sure what makes the CFO of Rocket Lab think that. I would expect the rate of F9 Starlink launches to drop substantially as Starship comes online.
If SpaceX is redirecting their F9 capacity for internal consumption then perhaps the plans they had with Starship timelines aren’t going well.
Starship is behind schedule, but deploying Starlink satellites is one of the few milestones we’ve already seen demonstrated. As soon as they can confidently deorbit the ship, they can go fully orbital and start launching v3 Starlink satellites.
Is it possible that SpaceX are thinking of phasing out Falcon 9 entirely around 2029, but are unsure if they will have a method of deploying non-Starlink payloads from Starship by then?
Is it possible that SpaceX are thinking of phasing out Falcon 9 entirely around 2029, but are unsure if they will have a method of deploying non-Starlink payloads from Starship by then?
I seriously doubt F9 is gone in 2029. It takes quite awhile to get a rocket certified for government payloads which are a large part of SpaceX launch manifest. Even longer to get crew rating assuming the ISS is still around.