Satellite technology, as the strategic commanding heights of modern countries, has huge application value in military and national defense, broadband communications and other fields. As a “force multiplier” for modern military power, satellite technology is the key to winning information wars. Developing advanced satellite technology and building and maintaining its own satellite Internet constellations have become strategic priorities for the world’s major powers. As the two physical cornerstones for the survival and development of the satellite Internet industry, orbit and spectrum resources can be said to determine the life and death and future pattern of the industry. Currently, all countries are actively seizing scarce orbital resources and spectrum resources. What is behind this is essentially a “land enclosure movement” for dominance in the future digital era. The outcome of this movement may directly determine who has the strongest voice in the sky of global interconnection in the next few decades.
Currently, there is a certain gap between the number of satellites in orbit and the launch plan of our country compared with the United States. This directly reflects our country’s manufacturing and launch capabilities. From a technical perspective, the recycling and reuse capabilities of rockets may be the key reason restricting the construction of my country’s satellite Internet constellations. From a market perspective, my country’s satellite Internet industry is still in the exploratory stage, and the vitality of the commercial operation model needs to be stimulated. There are not only technical reasons behind this, but also many challenges such as cost, ecology and supervision.
Regarding rocket recovery and reuse technology, my country currently does not have a reusable rocket that can be used to undertake launch missions, which results in my country’s launch costs being generally high. Although some companies are conducting research on rocket reuse technology, for example, the Eighth Academy of Aerospace Science and Technology completed a 10-kilometer vertical take-off and landing test on June 23, 2024, and Blue Arrow Aerospace completed a 10-kilometer vertical take-off and landing test on September 11, 2024. However, these rockets have not entered the application stage and cannot undertake constellation networking tasks. In contrast, in the United States, Falcon 9, as the world’s first reusable launch vehicle developed by SpaceX, has significantly reduced the cost of entering space and increased the frequency of launches. At 16:12 on August 28, 2025, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket numbered B1067.30 launched 28 Starlink V2 Mini satellites into the predetermined orbit. The “30” at the end of the number indicates that a child has completed recycling and reuse 30 times. Judging from the launch frequency of SpaceX this year, SpaceX has launched a rocket every three days on average, and even set a new record of launching Starlink satellites twice in a row within 24 hours. The key behind this is the development of rocket recycling and reuse technology. Rocket recycling and reuse not only improves launch efficiency, but also reduces launch costs. According to the current market price, the launch cost of a new Falcon 9 rocket is approximately US$67 million, while the quoted price of a proven reusable rocket can be reduced to less than US$50 million.
In addition, for a long time, our country has taken advantage of the institutional advantage of “concentrating efforts to do big things” to complete the construction of strategic facilities such as Beidou navigation and space station construction, and achieved key breakthroughs in some core technologies. However, in the face of commercial aerospace companies such as SpaceX, our country also needs a large number of private aerospace companies to undertake a large number of launch missions to make up for the impact of my country’s traditional rocket power’s insufficient production capacity and transportation capacity. Judging from the development of SpaceX, its success is the result of all-round support provided by the United States in terms of policy, technology, talent, and funding. In terms of policy, the United States has issued the “National Space Policy” and “National Space Transportation Policy” to support the development of the commercial aerospace industry; in terms of technology and talent, NASA directly helps SpaceX develop and verify key technologies by dispatching technical personnel and transferring patents; in terms of finance, NASA provides financial support with a large number of orders. In the next step, our country may need to further strengthen the role of private aerospace enterprises as a “new force”, further enhance their innovation vitality through relevant measures, guide them to increase investment in research and development and technological innovation, form their own flagship products, and jointly help maintain our country’s aerospace safety and national security.
