Some of these companies are taking aim at SpaceX’s Falcon 9, which can lift as much as 20,000 kilograms into orbit and is used for sending multiple satellites or the crewed Dragon into space. “There is a practical monopoly in the medium-lift launch market right now, with really only one operational vehicle,” says Murielle Baker, a spokesperson for Rocket Lab, a US-New Zealand company.
Rocket Lab plans to take on the Falcon 9 with its Neutron rocket, which is expected to have its inaugural flight later this year from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The effort is building on the success of the company’s smaller Electron rocket, and Neutron’s first stage is intended to be reusable after it parachutes down to the ocean.
Another challenger is Texas-based Firefly, whose Alpha rocket can be launched from multiple spaceports so that it can reach different orbits. Firefly has already secured NASA and Space Force contracts, with more launches coming this year (and on March 2 it also became the second private company to successfully land a spacecraft on the moon). Next year, Relativity Space aims to loft its first Terran R rocket, which is partially built from 3D-printed components. And the Bill Gates–backed Stoke Space aims to launch its reusable Nova rocket in late 2025 or, more likely, next year.
Competitors are also rising for SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy, holding out the prospect of more options for sending massive payloads to higher orbits and deep space. Furthest along is the Vulcan Centaur rocket, a creation of United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. It’s expected to have its third and fourth launches in the coming months, delivering Space Force satellites to orbit. Powered by engines from Blue Origin, the Vulcan Centaur is slightly wider and shorter than the Falcon rockets. It currently isn’t reusable, but it’s less expensive than its predecessors, ULA’s Atlas V and Delta IV, which are being phased out.
Mark Peller, the company’s senior vice president on Vulcan development and advanced programs, says the new rocket comes with multiple advantages. “One is overall value, in terms of dollars per pound to orbit and what we can provide to our customers,” he says, “and the second is versatility: Vulcan was designed to go to a range of orbits.” He says more than 80 missions are already lined up.
Vulcan’s fifth flight, slated for no earlier than May, will launch the long-awaited Sierra Space Dream Chaser, a spaceplane that can carry cargo (and possibly crew) to the International Space Station. ULA also has upcoming Vulcan launches planned for Amazon’s Kuiper satellite constellation, a potential Starlink rival.
Meanwhile, though it took a few years, Blue Origin now has a truly orbital heavy-lift spacecraft: In January, it celebrated the inaugural launch of its towering New Glenn, a rocket that’s only a bit shorter than NASA’s Space Launch System and SpaceX’s Starship. Future flights could launch national security payloads.
Competition is emerging abroad as well. After repeated delays, Europe’s heavy-lift Ariane 6, from Airbus subsidiary Arianespace, had its inaugural flight last year, ending the European Space Agency’s temporary dependence on SpaceX. A range of other companies are trying to expand European launch capacity, with assistance from ESA.
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