Last Year’s US Rocket Launches Hit Record High... 9 Out of 10 Were SpaceX

Strengthening Market Dominance of Musk's SpaceX

Last year, the number of rockets reaching Earth's orbit from the United States hit an all-time high, with 9 out of 10 rocket launches conducted by SpaceX, the space company led by Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla.

On the 5th (local time), The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported, citing data from Dr. Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, that there were 145 rocket launches reaching Earth's orbit from the U.S. last year, marking a record high. This is five times the number recorded in 2017.

Of these, 134 launches (92.4%) were conducted by SpaceX. Most rocket launches took place at three locations: the U.S. Space Force bases at Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. WSJ stated, "Space companies like SpaceX plan to increase flight frequency in the coming years by transporting their own satellites and customer payloads into space," but also noted that "rocket launch sites are already saturated."

Accordingly, space companies are competing to secure launch site usage rights, and moves to check SpaceX have been observed. SpaceX aims to launch its Starship spacecraft, developed for lunar and Mars exploration, from Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Base in Florida. However, competitors have raised concerns about congestion issues that SpaceX's large rockets might cause, WSJ reported.

SpaceX is advancing by attempting for the first time to deploy mock satellites into space during the seventh Earth orbit test of the Starship spacecraft. Regarding the 7th test flight plan of Starship, CEO Musk announced on January 30 via X (formerly Twitter) that it would be on "(January) 10th." SpaceX began Starship Earth orbit test flights in April 2023 and conducted six test flights by November last year. The launch site of the 6th flight attracted attention when then-President-elect Donald Trump visited.

SpaceX also dominates the global low Earth orbit satellite communication market through its satellite internet service, Starlink. United Airlines, one of the three major U.S. airlines, announced on the same day that it will begin in-flight testing of Starlink service starting next month and plans to officially offer the service on some aircraft this spring. The goal is to expand internet service to major routes by the end of this year. Additionally, the Italian government is reportedly pursuing a contract worth 1.5 billion euros (approximately 2.3 trillion KRW) with SpaceX to build a secure communication network.

There are expectations that SpaceX's market dominance could grow further as CEO Musk has been appointed head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in the second Donald Trump administration, which will launch on the 20th of this month. According to Bloomberg News, SpaceX's recent corporate valuation is about $350 billion (approximately 514 trillion KRW), a 66% increase compared to the $210 billion (approximately 308 trillion KRW) valuation during the public offering in June last year.