Domestic Commercial Rockets Enter Batch Launch Era: Behind the Scenes a Sixfold Cost Gap and Reusability as the Key Breakthrough

Sci‑Tech Innovation Board Daily reported on October 19 that the cadence of domestic commercial rocket launches has accelerated markedly, with a nascent pattern of batch deployments becoming apparent. At midday today, Zhongke Aerospace’s Lijian‑1 Y8 carrier rocket launched from the Dongfeng Commercial Aerospace Innovation Test Zone using a “one‑rocket, three‑satellite” profile and successfully placed Zhongke Satellite 03 and 04 among other payloads into their planned orbits. In August alone China completed nine commercial launches, and at least 20 civil‑commercial rocket missions are scheduled for the year.

The global commercial space sector is witnessing parallel advances. SpaceX’s Starship V2 recently completed its 11th flight test, underlining continued international progress in reusability technology and establishing a new reference for global industrial competition.

Beneath the public excitement, however, multiple structural constraints within the industry are becoming increasingly visible. Interviews with senior practitioners reveal that the current challenges span technological maturation, industrial chain support and ecosystem construction, and that resolving these frictions is essential to sustain the sector’s growth trajectory.

On the technology front, a fully commercialized loop of repeatable recovery, refurbishment and reuse has yet to be closed domestically. A long‑serving R&D executive emphasized that rocket reusability requires the integration of return navigation, variable‑thrust propulsion and recovery systems, and that despite milestones such as Arrow Technology’s Yuanxingzhe‑1 achieving soft sea‑landing recovery and Deep Blue Aerospace validating 100‑ton class engine testing, a material gap persists relative to SpaceX’s established recover‑reuse‑iterate model.

Most domestic companies remain at the stage of single‑instance technical validation, so reuse frequency, recovery success rates and cost control mechanisms lack extensive operational validation. By contrast, Starship’s multiple test flights have demonstrated precise booster recovery and in‑orbit payload handling. This divergence in maturity constrains the ability of domestic commercial rockets to supply the high throughput required for large low‑Earth‑orbit constellations, and points to the imperative of focusing on practical reusability challenges rather than treating cost alone as the primary constraint.

From an operational perspective, iSpace’s board secretary Li Yongpeng observed that China executed nine launches within the first 25 days of August; if such tempo were sustained monthly, annual launch counts could approach 100. The August missions spanned eight rocket models and five launch sites, reflecting a deliberate, multi‑platform approach to offset the limited sortie rate of any single vehicle or site and evidencing that the domestic commercial space sector has entered a significantly accelerated phase.

Industry discussions indicate that the sector’s principal systemic bottleneck is not solely per‑launch cost but rather a critical shortage of aggregated lift capacity. Current comparisons put Chinese and U.S. payload capacities at a gap of roughly four to six times. Public figures show SpaceX’s Starship with near‑EO capacity on the order of 150 tonnes, whereas China’s most capable operational launcher, Long March 5, provides approximately 25 tonnes to low‑Earth orbit, implying an approximate sixfold capacity differential. China is advancing heavy‑lift development; Long March 9 is planned for completion before 2035 and is designed to reach similar heavy‑lift metrics, including about 150 tonnes to low‑Earth orbit and 50 tonnes to lunar transfer.

Zhongke Aerospace chairman and CEO Yang Yiqiang told Sci‑Tech Innovation Board Daily that current commercial pricing for the company’s solid rockets is around ¥60,000–¥70,000 per kilogram. Whole‑vehicle charters carry a relatively lower per‑kilogram rate owing to exclusive use, while rideshare launches involve additional coordination and integration costs that raise unit pricing. Yang projects that with iterations such as the Lijian‑2 liquid rocket—designed for more than 20 reuses and benefiting from lower‑cost liquid propellants and structural optimization—per‑kilogram launch costs could decline to just over ¥20,000, approaching international low‑cost benchmarks.

Market offers for commercial launch services vary significantly at present, with mainstream commercial quotes concentrated between ¥50,000 and ¥100,000 per kilogram and certain small‑launcher or specialized orbit missions quoted as high as ¥150,000 per kilogram. Under those assumptions, launching a 500‑kilogram satellite could cost up to ¥75 million. Notably, as satellite manufacturing for mid‑sized platforms matures and per‑unit production costs fall to approximately ¥50–60 million for a 500‑kilogram craft, launch expenses in some cases may exceed satellite build costs, creating a structural constraint on large‑scale constellation deployment.

Comparative data illustrate the cost differentials tied to vehicle model and operational mode. Long March 3B expenditures averaged ¥390 million per mission across five flights in 2023, translating to roughly ¥70,900 per kilogram based on a 5.5‑ton capacity. Long March 2D procurement for an internal satellite in 2022 was priced at ¥113 million per mission, or about ¥28,200 per kilogram on a 4‑ton basis. In the U.S. market, a fully reused Falcon 9 can lower LEO costs to $2,000–$2,500 per kilogram (approximately ¥14,000–¥18,000), and even without booster recovery costs generally remain below ¥28,000 per kilogram; by contrast, some small‑launcher providers command $30,000–$40,000 per kilogram (roughly ¥210,000–¥280,000).

These contrasts underscore that raising total lift capacity and reuse rates is central to driving down unit costs. Engine and first‑stage structural costs dominate the cost base, with first‑stage hardware typically accounting for more than 70% of vehicle expense. Recovering and reusing the first stage therefore materially reduces per‑launch amortization if recovery and refurbishment workflows are reliable and efficient.

Domestic actors are actively pursuing vertical‑landing liquid‑rocket solutions as the principal route to high‑frequency, high‑capacity, low‑cost operations. Liquid propulsion with restartable engines and variable thrust enables trajectory and thrust optimization, yields high specific impulse and supports precise landing control, concentrating valuable components in the recoverable stage. Compared with parachute‑assisted partial recovery for solid or hybrid systems—limited by fixed thrust and greater impact loads—liquid vertical recovery offers superior reuse economics and operational flexibility, which is why it is broadly regarded as the mainstream global pathway.

Progress on vertical recovery validation in China has accelerated. iSpace completed the country’s first full‑scale vertical takeoff and landing test of a first‑stage module and related reuse trials by the end of 2023, and its reusable Hyperbola‑3 vehicle is expected to undergo orbital insertion and recovery validation within about a year. LandSpace, Shanghai Aerospace and other firms have also executed vertical‑recovery tests. LandSpace has reported both 100‑meter and 10,000‑meter vertical landing trials, providing empirical validation of key recovery technologies and product capabilities. Several companies’ published roadmaps indicate multiple reusable vehicle flight and recovery attempts planned before mid‑2026, and LandSpace’s Zhuque‑3 is positioned to attempt China’s first orbital recovery in Q4 2025.

Zhongke Aerospace has likewise advanced liquid reusable‑rocket development, with the Lijian‑2 program scheduled for a maiden flight in Q4 2025. The initial flight will be a non‑recoverable configuration powered by three YF‑102 kerosene‑oxygen engines on the core first stage and one YF‑102V on the second stage; recoverable variants will later employ Zhongke’s domestically developed Liqing‑2 engine. Yang noted that the company has resolved multiple scientific and technical issues relevant to reusability and has achieved successful semi‑system testing of the Liqing‑2 engine.

Beyond technological validation, scaling production capacity is emerging as a decisive competitive dimension. The ability to transition from single‑unit demonstration to high‑volume manufacture will determine which companies can meet the surge in demand for high‑frequency launches. Current plans suggest substantial capacity targets: the Lijian‑2 super‑factory aims for an annual output on the order of 20 mid‑to‑large liquid rockets; iSpace’s industrial base contemplates annual production of 20 Hyperbola‑3 vehicles; and other entrants are assembling manufacturing systems designed to deliver dozens of vehicles per year. Achieving this leap from prototype to mass delivery may prove the pivotal capability that separates market leaders from peers in the imminent period of constellation expansion.