The commercial launch industry

node

The set of firms selling access to orbit, and the most visible yet smallest major segment of the space economy — on the satellite industry's own segment accounting, launch services have consistently accounted for a low single-digit percentage of total satellite industry revenue. The market is unusually concentrated: one American provider carries the large majority of global upmass, while Europe's Ariane 6 flew first in July 2024 after a gap in European independent access, United Launch Alliance's Vulcan Centaur debuted in January 2024, Blue Origin's New Glenn first flew in January 2025, and Rocket Lab's small Electron built a separate business on dedicated launches for payloads that will not wait for a rideshare. China operates both state and commercially structured providers, with methane-fuelled vehicles from newer Chinese firms reaching orbit from 2023. Russia's share of the commercial market, historically substantial, collapsed after 2022. The sector's economics are brutal: development costs are enormous, the addressable market is small, and a provider without an anchor customer — a constellation, a government, or itself — has never sustained a high flight rate. Not a place.

A node is not a place. Drawing it on a map would assert something about the world that no stored fact supports.