When Elon Musk founded SpaceX in 2002 with ambitions as grandiose as the conquest of Mars, few would have bet money on him unseating the two giants of the US space industry: Boeing and Lockheed Martin. Now it is a reality in every sense because SpaceX has just officially become the main military launcher in the United States.
Surpasso. The US Space Force has awarded $13.7 billion in public contracts to launch the Pentagon’s most critical satellites into space between now and the beginning of the next decade. These include new advanced GPS satellites and strategic communications systems capable of withstanding even nuclear conflict.
SpaceX has taken the lion’s share of the pie with 28 missions, valued at $5.9 billion. That’s nine more than the 19 awarded to United Launch Alliance (the joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin). For its part, Blue Origin (the aerospace company of Jeff Bezos) has received seven missions.
Goodbye to the duopoly. When New Space emerged with new rocket start-ups like SpaceX and Blue Origin, Boeing and Lockheed Martin shielded their military contracts with a joint venture called ULA. For years, and thanks to the proven reliability of its rockets, the Pentagon continued to feed the duopoly with the exclusivity of its juicy contracts.
SpaceX managed to break the mold in 2015 with its first military contract after a tough legal battle to compete on equal terms. Since then, it has not only managed to consolidate its position, but also become the preferred supplier of the Space Force with the highest number of contracts.
No more excuses. With nearly 140 successful launches in the last year and more competitive rates than the competition thanks to its unique reusability, the Pentagon doesn’t have many excuses for maintaining the preferential treatment of ULA over SpaceX.
SpaceX was asking the Space Force $212 million per launch for its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, compared to the $282 million ULA was asking for the Vulcan and the $341 million Blue Origin was asking for the powerful New Glenn rocket, which has barely flown once.
It’s a close match. Despite everything, ULA still has a lot to offer with its new Vulcan rocket, especially thanks to the Centaur V upper stage, which offers greater maneuverability and thrust in orbit than SpaceX’s Falcon rockets.
Blue Origin, meanwhile, has the most powerful rocket of the four, with a huge fairing that can accommodate all kinds of payloads, and the same aspirations for reusability as SpaceX. However, it has barely completed a test launch, and failed in its first attempt to land on a barge in the Atlantic. It has at least one more certification flight to go before it can launch military payloads.
