2023 Payload to Orbit by Launch Provider

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1732393496428896557

In kilograms.

SpaceX has launched 80% of all mass to orbit so far in 2023! All other launch providers worldwide just 20% combined.

When Starship is operational, it will be able to put this much mass in orbit in less than four launches. (They anticipate it flying several times a week.)

That will be a game changer. Suddenly large space stations and orbital factories and shipyards start to become realistic. A whole off-world economy could start to develop. To say nothing of the Moon and Mars.

I'm an old science-fiction nut. And it thrills me to see somebody actually doing it.

Of these launch providers, CASC is the Chinese government, and Galactic Energy, Expace and Landspace are Chinese "new space" companies that have succeeded in reaching orbit this year. China is actively promoting space entrepeneurship. Why isn't Europe doing anything exciting?

The Korean Committee of Space Technology is the North Korean government. (The South Koreans can launch satellites on domestic small-sat rockets, but they haven't this year. Instead they hire SpaceX if they want a S. Korean satellite lofted.)

Blue Origin is nowhere to be seen, but hopefully that changes in 2024 if New Glenn can make it to orbit. Its reusability and its connection to Amazon and to Jeff Bezos' Project Kuiper should give them a nice launch manifest right out of the gate.

ULA's new single-use Vulcan is aiming for a first test flight on December 24. It still remains to be seen whether it can be competitive with Falcon9's reusability. It already has a nice launch manifest booked with US national security and Amazon Project Kuiper launches. ULA has longer-term plans for Vulcan's engines and thrust dome to detach, reenter with an inflatable LOFTID heat shield (that ULA is perfecting, a very cool thing) thus saving the engines, most expensive part of the rocket, for reuse with new fuel tanks (relatively cheap to produce).

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China has responded. Their government space authorities call SpaceX an ‘unprecedented challenge’ and say that a ‘deep sense of crisis’ is needed if China is to narrow the technology gap and become a world-leading space power. They say that Chinese aerospace workers need to overcome their complacency and work harder to keep up with SpaceX.

The new space-race is well and truly on! I love to see it, as long as it's peaceful. Competition is a good thing, if it motivates progress and advancement.

(Dec 6, 2023 06:36 PM)Yazata Wrote: China has responded. Their government space authorities call SpaceX an ‘unprecedented challenge’ and say that a ‘deep sense of crisis’ is needed if China is to narrow the technology gap and become a world-leading space power. They say that Chinese aerospace workers need to overcome their complacency and work harder to keep up with SpaceX.

People are commenting that the challenge that China is concerned about isn't coming from NASA, but rather from SpaceX.

CNBC says

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/12/13/spacex-v...rizon.html

The valuation of Elon Musk’s SpaceX hit $180 billion based on an ongoing secondary share sale, CNBC confirmed Wednesday...

SpaceX typically performs these secondary rounds about twice a year, to give employees and other company shareholders a chance to sell stock. The latest valuation represents a 20% increase from SpaceX’s previous high of $150 billion, which the company hit through a July secondary sale at $81 a share...

SpaceX’s latest valuation ranks the company above the market value of any of the top U.S. defense contractors — including

Boeing (about $150 billion)
Lockheed Martin (about $112 billion)
and Northrop Grumman (about $73 billion)

— as well as the most valuable U.S. telecommunications companies — such as

Verizon (about $154 billion)
or AT&T (about $115.9 billion)...