SpaceX, ULA, Blue Origin land $13.7 billion in national security launches
SpaceX took the biggest piece of the pie, but United Launch Alliance and newcomer Blue Origin will divvy up nearly $13.7 billion in national security launches to be assigned over the next five years, the Space Force announced Friday.
The National Security Space Launch (NSSL) Phase 3 Lane 2 announcements made by the Space Force's Space Systems Command expect to parse out the lucrative task orders giving Elon Musk's SpaceX more than $5.9 billion, ULA more than $5.3 billion and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin nearly $2.4 billion spread among more than 54 expected missions to be awarded through 2029.
The Space Force expects launches to fly about two to three years after being awarded, so the contracts will be for launches through 2032.
'Today's award culminates nearly three years of government and industry partnership to increase launch resiliency and capacity,' explained Brig. Gen. Kristin Panzenhagen, program executive officer for the Space Force's Assured Access to Space program, a role she holds on top of running Space Launch Delta 45 out of Patrick Space Force Base. 'The result is assured access to space for our national security missions, which increases the military's readiness.'
The national security manifest for the next five years of task orders was split into two lanes carving out Lane 2 for the most reliable rockets: SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy, ULA's newly certified Vulcan and Blue Origin's New Glenn, which still needs to fly one more mission before being certified.
A Lane 1 under the contract has been set aside for 30 missions worth another $5.6 billion to be assigned through 2029 designed to allow for the onboarding of new launch providers in addition to Blue Origin, ULA and SpaceX. The payloads for the Lane 1 missions are considered more risk-tolerant, and would open up an on-ramp for the likes of new launch providers such as Firefly Aerospace, Rocket Lab or Relativity Space.
So far, though, only SpaceX has landed any of the Lane 1 missions, getting the first two contracts announced last October worth more than $733.5 million that will require nine launches.
The Lane 2 announcement was expected before the end of 2024 as well, with the Space Force normally targeting October at the beginning of each fiscal year to declare which companies won contracts.
And despite declaring how the next five-years' worth of launches will be divided, the 2025 task orders have yet to be announced, although they would only be split between SpaceX and ULA, while Blue Origin would be considered among task orders given in 2026.
The five-year breakdown calls for 28 missions to be awarded to SpaceX across the five years, or about 52% of the 54 missions, with ULA getting 19, or 35%, and Blue Origin getting seven, or nearly 13%.
'America leads the world in space launch, and through these NSSL Phase 3 Lane 2 contracts, we will ensure continued access to this vital domain,' said Maj. Gen. Stephen Purdy, acting assistant secretary of the Air Force for space acquisition and integration. 'These awards bolster our ability to launch critical defense satellites while strengthening our industrial base and enhancing operational readiness.'
The Space Force stated the 2025 task orders will come after Space Systems Command confers with the National Reconnaissance Office.
Launches will occur from both the Space Coast and Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The breakdown is a flip since the NSSL Phase 2 awards were first announced in 2020, when SpaceX was still the newcomer competing with ULA's stranglehold on national security missions. At the time, the government said it would award ULA 60% of those missions with SpaceX getting 40%.
Delays to ULA's Vulcan rocket, though, saw the two companies nearly splitting the missions evenly by the end of the final task orders given out in 2024. ULA had previously landed the majority of Phase 1 awards from last decade as well, and has flown 100 missions for the Department of Defense.
'Vulcan is the right choice for critical national security space missions and is the only rocket today designed to meet all the requirements of our nation's space launch needs,' said Tory Bruno, ULA's president and CEO.
Vulcan, which flew twice in 2024, was only certified last month by the Space Force, and still has a backlog of 24 national security missions to fly from Phase 2. The new rocket's delay forced ULA to shift one of the original task orders given in 2020 to one of its few remaining Atlas V rockets, and the government opted to switch one mission to SpaceX.
Because of delays in certification, ULA actually pulled back a Vulcan ready to fly the second of those 2020 task orders, the USSF-106 mission, switching it up to allow for a commercial mission to be flown on an Atlas V for Amazon's first operational launch of its Project Kuiper constellation of internet satellites. That rocket is slated to fly as early as Wednesday from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 41.
Once the Amazon launch is up, USSF-106 is likely to be the first of several national security missions to fly this year as ULA plays catchup.
Blue Origin's New Glenn, meanwhile, expects to fly its second certification flight in late spring. The rocket was recently cleared to fly after the Federal Aviation Administration accepted Blue Origin's investigation into why its attempt to land its first-stage rocket on its debut launch went awry.
'It's an honor and huge responsibility to team with the U.S. government to launch our nation's most important assets,' said Jarrett Jones, Blue Origin's senior vice president for New Glenn. 'Through this partnership, we're looking forward to delivering on a number of critical national security priorities.'
New Glenn launched for the first time in January from Canaveral's Launch Complex 36, and Blue Origin became the first commercial company to make it successfully to orbit on its rocket's debut launch despite the attempted booster recovery failure.
The heavy-lift rocket also has several missions to fly for Amazon as well as contracts for NASA to fly a pair of astronauts to Mars and missions to get the company's Blue Moon lander on the moon as part of the Artemis program.
Musk said SpaceX taking the lead on the new missions may sound generous, but that its competitors would not be able to deliver the remaining task orders in the government's required timeline.
'I hope they succeed, but they aren't there yet,' he posted on X.
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