[10] By 2021, the monopoly previously held by nation states to be the only entities to fund, train, and send astronauts for human space exploration was ending as the first mission with exclusively private citizens—Inspiration4—was launched in September 2021.
The rocket and capsule for the flight, the training, and the funding are all provided by private entities outside of the traditional NASA process that had held the US monopoly since the early 1960s.
[14] DARPA's Simon P. Worden and the USAF's Jess Sponable analyzed the situation in 2006 and offered that, "One bright point is the emerging private sector, which [was then] pursuing suborbital or small lift capabilities."
";[14] demonstrating capabilities that would grow in the next five years while supporting published list prices substantially below the rates on offer by the national providers.
[15] Since the early 2010s, new private options for obtaining spaceflight services emerged, bringing substantial price pressure into the existing market.
[19] In November 2013, Arianespace announced new pricing flexibility for the "lighter satellites" it carries to orbits aboard its Ariane 5 in response to SpaceX's growing presence in the worldwide launch market.
In early December 2013, SpaceX flew its first launch to a geostationary transfer orbit providing additional credibility to its low prices which had been published since at least 2009.
Reusable Falcon 9s [were project to potentially decrease] the price by an order of magnitude, sparking more space-based enterprise, which in turn would drop the cost of access to space still further through economies of scale.
... [C]onsiderable efforts to restore competitiveness in price of the existing European launcher need to be undertaken if Europe is [to] maintain its market situation.
In the short term, a more favorable pricing policy for the small satellites currently being targeted by SpaceX seems indispensable to keeping the Ariane launch manifest strong and well-populated.
[31] In June 2014, Arianespace CEO Stéphane Israël announced that European efforts to remain competitive in response to SpaceX's recent success had begun in earnest.
Eutelsat CEO Michel de Rosen said, in reference to ESA's program to develop the Ariane 6, "Each year that passes will see SpaceX advance, gain market share and further reduce its costs through economies of scale.
"[37] European government research ministers approved the development of the new European rocket—Ariane 6—in December 2014, projecting the rocket would be "cheaper to construct and to operate" and that "more modern methods of production and a streamlined assembly to try to reduce unit costs" plus "the rocket's modular design can be tailored to a wide range of satellite and mission types [so it] should gain further economies from frequent use.
"[15] In 2015, the ESA was attempting to reorganize to reduce bureaucracy and decrease inefficiencies in launcher and satellite spending which had been tied historically to the amount of tax funds that each country has provided to it.
Still, "Arianespace remained confident it could maintain its 50% share of the space launch market despite SpaceX's slashing prices by building reliable rockets that are smaller and cheaper.
[50] In early 2019, the French "Court of Audit criticized Arianespace for what it "perceived as an unsustainable and overly cautious response to the swift rise of SpaceX’s affordable and reusable Falcon 9 rocket."
The Ariane 6 was found to be uncompetitive with SpaceX launch service provider options, and further found that "the most probable outcome for Ariane 6 is one in which the very existence of the rocket will be predicated upon continual annual subsidies from the European Space Agency (ESA) in order to make up for the rocket’s inability to sustain commercial orders beyond a handful of discounted shoo-in contracts.
While private satellite manufacturing companies had previously raised large capital rounds, that has been the largest investment to date in a launch service provider.
"[7] In early 2015, the French space agency CNES began working with Germany and a few other governments to start a modest research effort with a hope to propose a LOX/methane reusable launch system, to supplement or replace the Ariane 6 that was only then beginning full development in Europe,[69] by mid-2015, and subsequently[when?]
The stated design objective was to reduce both the cost and duration of reusable vehicle refurbishment and was partially motivated by the pressure of lower-cost competitive options with newer technological capabilities not found in the Ariane 6.
The US government is developing the Space Launch System (SLS), capable of lifting very large payloads of 70 to 130 metric tons (150,000 to 290,000 lb) from Earth.
On the commercial side, SpaceX has been privately developing their next-generation Starship launch system,[80] featuring fully reusable boosters and spacecraft, and targeting 150 metric tons (330,000 lb) of payload.
However, should SpaceX make solid progress on the development of its BFR over the coming years, it is almost unavoidable that America’s two HLVs will attract comparisons and a healthy debate, potentially at the political level.
[83] SpaceX intends this approach to bring significant cost savings that will help the company justify the development expense of designing and building the Starship system.
The management layoffs were the "beginning of a major reorganization and redesign" as ULA endeavors to "slash costs and hunt out new customers to ensure continued growth despite the rise of [SpaceX]".
"[99] Jean Botti, Chief technology officer for Airbus (which makes the Ariane 5) warned that "those who don't take Elon Musk seriously will have a lot to worry about.
"[102] Airbus Group CEO Tom Enders said: "The only way to do it for big companies is really to create spaces outside of the main business where we allow and where we incentivize experimentation ... That is what we have started to do but there is no manual ...
The stress on stage or engine structures of high-speed passage through the atmosphere, the performance penalty of reserving fuel for the return flight instead of maximizing rocket lift capacity, the need for many annual launches to make the economics work – all remain issues.
In April 2018, Russia's chief spaceflight official, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said in an interview, "The share of launch vehicles is as small as four percent of the overall market of space services.
"[114] The country is doing this separately from the normal intergovernmental projects of the European Space Agency, where France also plays a major role since the ESA founding.