SpaceX Competitors

Discussions center on SpaceX's market dominance in reusable rocket launches and lower costs compared to competitors like Blue Origin, Boeing, ULA, and Rocket Lab, debating monopoly risks, government contracts, and the lack of viable alternatives.

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Keywords

US CTO ArianeSpace FCC ULA EU SLS ycombinator.com MILITARIES OneWeb spacex launch blue origin rockets rocket launches space origin blue bezos

Sample Comments

jokoon May 19, 2014 View on HN

is this some sort of costly competition to space x in a way ?

higherpurpose Aug 25, 2014 View on HN

Hopefully it's SpaceX. The other two have fatten enough on wasteful government contracts.

greedo Apr 17, 2021 View on HN

So SpaceX, which is planning on flying a rich artist around the Moon isn't interested in space tourism? And we do know some of BO's goals; they want to have a Starlink like system. That's in direct competition with SpaceX, and SpaceX is far and away the leader in this field.If you look at it in terms of capabilities, SpaceX checks all the boxes; reusable rockets, rapid turnaround, lowest cost. Once Starship is usable for payloads, no other launch provider will be able to compet

andersa Nov 21, 2024 View on HN

Why can they not operate like SpaceX does?

tonyhart7 Jun 6, 2025 View on HN

"They didn't care that they were providing launch capabilities for a competitor"Yeah because another internet provider did not have SpaceX reusable rocket technologyits not really quite the same you know

consumer451 May 30, 2024 View on HN

SpaceX is a true marvel.The closest competitor is Peter Beck's Rocket Lab. That's why SpaceX is using their monopoly position to attack them.[0] As I said in a different post, Beck is a combo of Musk and Tom Mueller.[1] The "only" things that Rocket Lab is missing is first-mover advantage, and billions of investment.[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40512353[1] <a href="h

burkaman Jul 28, 2025 View on HN

NASA is a SpaceX funder/customer, not a competitor.

pixl97 Nov 24, 2023 View on HN

Almost all of spaceXs launches are to launch their own sats. Simply put if their costs were as high as other providers they couldn't afford to do it. Other providers costs are out of control.

panick21_ May 5, 2023 View on HN

No we are not. Because players like Amazon literally just spend like 5 billion on launches for SpaceX competitors. And many other constellation will do the same.The government already is forced to have at least 2 providers and they want more not less.Other governments, Europe, India and China will not simply give up.And while talking about entities with absurd money, Bezos has spend a decade now funding Blue origin he will not just give up.Venture capitalist are still funding many ne

sandworm101 Jul 10, 2024 View on HN

There is more to SpaceX than just cost comparisons. SpaceX is a US company, meaning anyone wanting on the rocket has to submit to a host of space-related regulations and US national security policies. Some launches don't want to, or cannot, deal with such oversight. A doubling of launch costs seems huge, but operating satellites isn't cheap. Many launches may prefer the premium price if it means launching on a European rocket.