this post was submitted on 18 Jun 2025
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Unfortunately, the next competitor will be Amazon...
And then we'll see what happens next, getting a whole constellation up is no small feat, I can't see a third company getting a system working before 2050.
The satellite constellation is the natural consequence of cheaper rockets. It's a true paradigm shift, but the pioneer in this case has only the moat of being able to spend less money per launch. If someone else can deliver payloads to low earth orbit for less than $2,000/kg, then they'll easily be able to launch a Starlink competitor.
Again, the only possible player that could do that any time soon is blue origin/Amazon.
Stoke Space is working on a fully reusable rocket though, I'm really impressed with their rocket concept, some very smart design choices were made. They do have working hardware and have demonstrated their core engine. But I have no idea how close they are to first launch tests, I expect it will be a while
Your original comment said 2050, which is a long way off. SpaceX's first launch attempt was in 2006, their first successful launch was in 2008, their first successful recovery of a rocket in reusable condition was in 2015, and first reused a rocket in 2017. If they can make progress on that kind of timeline, why wouldn't someone else be able to?
That's a fair point. Keep in mind though, it takes a while to get a whole constellation up in orbit and get all the kinks worked out, Starlink was first usable in 2020. So in total it took them in the area of 14 years from start to finish. It's also worth noting, that nobody in the space industry has really ever been able to move as fast as spaceX, they're something of an anomaly, not the norm.
So could a new company do it in 14 years? Yeah, that's definitely possible. It could happen by 2039, but I wouldn't put money on it. 25 years seems more likely.
We won't live that long.
Not with that attitude!
Arianespace has fallen behind, but they're not out of the picture. They're still by far the largest competitor to SpaceX, and they're aiming for their 7th generation Ariane to be a reusable design.
Arianespace is an Airbus and Safran subsidiary, so it's not like they don't have the engineering oomph behind them.
Also with starlink even one company's constellation is causing issues with astronomers and launches.
How bad will it be if there are 5-6 different companies with their own network floating around up there. And then other countries with their own network.
Yeah, it's a bad situation. I'm against monopolies, but I also see how filling the sky with redundant satellites is a terrible plan, so I don't like the idea of lots of competition either.
I think low orbit satellite communications is a pretty awesome concept. It has the potential to become like a second Internet backbone, but a backbone that can bring data directly to users without the additional router hops that local ISPs introduce. On paper, it's amazingly efficient and can distribute service to all of the world... But in practice the business and management side is deeply problematic. One company should absolutely not be in charge of global Internet service. And one country would not be any better.
The only solution I can see is to make it safe and feasible to have way more satellites operating in low earth orbit. I'm really not sure what that solution might look like...
Here's an off-the-cuff idea though: One solution could be an extremely robust low earth orbit maintenance and "pruning" system. All satellites would need to be monitored by third parties. And those third parties would need the authority and ability to quickly deorbit (prune) any satellite that deviates from its exact expected orbit. If satellites can ensure no deviation from their path and can safely maneuver to avoid collisions, it could be possible for many more satellites to safely share an orbital altitude.
Deorbiting is all well and good, but more and more we're finding that these satellites contain chemicals that are very disruptive to the ozone layer. It's going to be CFCs all over again, but with even more corporate capture of government.
That's a fair point. The alternative is taking things up to a "graveyard orbit" somewhere between LEO and GSO, to a particularly unpopular altitude, where nobody's fighting for real estate. Satellites can sit there indefinitely, you could even clump them up in a big ball, the tiny pull of gravity they have is actually enough to keep them bunched together.
The only problem with that plan is that it takes a lot of energy to raise an orbit that much, I'm not sure how to make that feasible.
Lowering the orbit takes energy, too, unless you're relying solely on atmospheric drag.
Sure, but you can safely deorbit something from Leo with like 100 m/s of Delta v, you just need to dip into the atmosphere and then drag does the rest. Getting something to a sufficiently high graveyard orbit is more like 2000 Dv split between two burns. You'd need to stay with the trash for half an orbit and then do the second half of your burn, and then presumably you'd need to travel back to your original point, costing another 2000 Dv.
All together, going up could take 40x more propellant than going down.
I know Blue Horizon or whatever it's called has had minor success with rockets. What's stopping Honda from out-competing them? Could it be a funding problem? (I know Blue Horizon has a lot of Amazon funding)
Well yeah, blue origin has already successfully orbited their rocket. Their rocket which has a 45 ton to low earth orbit payload capacity, about the same as the Saturn V (so actually impressive as fuck).
So the head start is what keeps Honda from out competing them. They're at least 10 years ahead of Honda (but likely more). And BO is solely focused on space, Honda on the other hand isn't going to prioritize that arm of development over others. So I can't really see Honda winning that sprint, if they're not totally committed to the race.