Updated family of advanced spacecraft delivers
speed, affordability, performance, and configurability for a range
of mission profiles and customers
Rocket Lab USA, Inc (Nasdaq: RKLB) (“Rocket Lab” or “the
Company”), a leading launch and space systems company, today
introduced its family of spacecraft buses, consolidating the custom
designs Rocket Lab has developed for multiple customers and
missions. The family of spacecraft is the result of more than four
years of development into Rocket Lab’s space systems
capabilities.
“We’ve had the privilege of developing, launching, and operating
spacecraft for a broad range of customers and they’ve all told us
the same thing: They need reliable and highly capable spacecraft
built quickly and affordably. Photon was the start, but the Rocket
Lab spacecraft family has grown,” said Rocket Lab founder and CEO
Peter Beck. “We’ve developed a configurable spacecraft line that
delivers high performance at scale, supported by an experienced
team, technical maturity, a vertically-integrated supply chain, and
advanced manufacturing, test and operations facilities. We’ve
designed these spacecraft through close collaboration with our
customers to support real missions at constellation scale. The hard
development work is done, and now these spacecraft are available as
off-the-shelf products, or they can be further customized to meet
specific mission requirements.”
The spacecraft share many common components and subsystems,
designed and manufactured in-house by Rocket Lab, including carbon
composite structures, star trackers, reaction wheels, solar arrays,
radios, separation systems, avionics, flight and ground
software.
"Through vertical integration, we’re able to deliver spacecraft
quickly, affordably and reliably using flight-proven components,”
says Rocket Lab Vice President Space Systems, Brad Clevenger.
“We’ve struck the right balance between commonality to deliver
cost-effective, rapid production and ensuring our spacecraft are
configurable to suit unique and specific mission profiles.”
Rocket Lab’s family of spacecraft includes:
Photon: The original Rocket Lab spacecraft, Photon is the
Company’s integrated launch-plus-spacecraft solution. Photon is a
modified Electron Kick Stage with power, propulsion, and
communications to deliver a capable low Earth orbit (LEO) platform
that serves civil, defense and commercial customers across a range
of missions. With a mass of 200-300kg, Photon is launched on
Electron for responsive space and other challenging missions like
cryogenic fuel demonstration, taking advantage of precision orbit
insertion, launch on demand, and the lowest launch environments in
industry.
Lightning: Rocket Lab’s newest spacecraft bus is designed
for a 12+ year orbital lifespan in LEO, delivers high power and
high radiation tolerance, incorporating redundancy in critical
subsystems. This ~3 kW bus is ideal for high operational duty cycle
telecommunications and remote sensing applications. Lightning can
be launched on Neutron and other medium and heavy launch vehicles.
Lightning is based on the same design as the custom spacecraft
Rocket Lab developed for MDA and Globalstar and is the basis for
the Company’s bus for the Space Development Agency.
Pioneer: A highly configurable medium delta-V platform
designed to support payloads up to 120 kg and unique mission
profiles, including re-entry missions for Varda Space Industries,
and dynamic space operations. Depending on the mission profile,
Pioneer can be launched on Electron, Neutron or other launch
vehicles.
Explorer: A high delta-V spacecraft with large propellant
tanks, deep space capable avionics, and ranging transponders.
Explorer enables small spacecraft missions to planetary
destinations like Mars and Venus, the Moon, highly eccentric Earth
orbits, geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO), Earth-moon Lagrange
points, Earth-sun Lagrange points, and near Earth objects (NEOs).
Depending on the mission profile, Explorer can be launched on
Electron, Neutron or other launch vehicles. Explorer gained flight
heritage during the CAPSTONE mission to the Moon for NASA and forms
the basis of the twin spacecraft Rocket Lab is developing for the
ESCAPADE mission to Mars for NASA and the University of California,
Berkeley.
Each member of Rocket Lab’s spacecraft family is currently in
production in a range of quantities for different customers, with
more than 40 satellites currently in backlog. To support the rapid
production of our family of spacecraft, Rocket Lab has established
an advanced spacecraft development and manufacturing complex at the
Company’s Long Beach headquarters. The facility includes over
10,000 sq. ft. of cleanroom and 40,000 sq. ft. of additional
production & test facilities designed to support constellation
class manufacturing and satellite assembly, integration and test
for commercial, civil and national security customers.
Learn more about Rocket Lab’s family of spacecraft here.
www.rocketlabusa.com/spacecraft
+ About Rocket Lab
Founded in 2006, Rocket Lab is an end-to-end space company with
an established track record of mission success. We deliver reliable
launch services, satellite manufacture, spacecraft components, and
on-orbit management solutions that make it faster, easier and more
affordable to access space. Headquartered in Long Beach,
California, Rocket Lab designs and manufactures the Electron small
orbital launch vehicle and the Photon satellite platform and is
developing the Neutron 13-ton payload class launch vehicle. Since
its first orbital launch in January 2018, Rocket Lab’s Electron
launch vehicle has become the second most frequently launched U.S.
rocket annually and has delivered 177 satellites to orbit for
private and public sector organizations, enabling operations in
national security, scientific research, space debris mitigation,
Earth observation, climate monitoring, and communications. Rocket
Lab’s Photon spacecraft platform has been selected to support NASA
missions to the Moon and Mars, as well as the first private
commercial mission to Venus. Rocket Lab has three launch pads at
two launch sites, including two launch pads at a private orbital
launch site located in New Zealand and a third launch pad in
Virginia, USA. To learn more, visit www.rocketlabusa.com.
+ FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS
This press release contains forward-looking statements within
the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of
1995. We intend such forward-looking statements to be covered by
the safe harbor provisions for forward looking statements contained
in Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the
“Securities Act”) and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of
1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”). All statements contained in
this press release other than statements of historical fact,
including, without limitation, statements regarding our launch and
space systems operations, launch schedule and window, safe and
repeatable access to space, Neutron development, operational
expansion and business strategy are forward-looking statements. The
words “believe,” “may,” “will,” “estimate,” “potential,”
“continue,” “anticipate,” “intend,” “expect,” “strategy,” “future,”
“could,” “would,” “project,” “plan,” “target,” and similar
expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements,
though not all forward-looking statements use these words or
expressions. These statements are neither promises nor guarantees,
but involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other
important factors that may cause our actual results, performance or
achievements to be materially different from any future results,
performance or achievements expressed or implied by the
forward-looking statements, including but not limited to the
factors, risks and uncertainties included in our Annual Report on
Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2023, as such
factors may be updated from time to time in our other filings with
the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”), accessible on
the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov and the Investor Relations section
of our website at www.rocketlabusa.com, which could cause our
actual results to differ materially from those indicated by the
forward-looking statements made in this press release. Any such
forward-looking statements represent management’s estimates as of
the date of this press release. While we may elect to update such
forward-looking statements at some point in the future, we disclaim
any obligation to do so, even if subsequent events cause our views
to change.
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+ Rocket Lab Media Contact Morgan Bailey
media@rocketlabusa.com
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