The space-tech industry has two pending IPOs. SpaceX’s eye-catching filing envisages a USD 1trn lunar economy comprising extraterrestrial data centres and passenger flights to Mars. The company, which also has business lines focused on connectivity and artificial intelligence, leads the private sector’s push into the US space industry, with 650 orbital launches to its name.

China’s Landspace won approval for a domestic listing via a profitability requirement waiver for companies that have achieved at least one orbital launch using reusable technology. The start-up, which has raised USD 450m in private funding from the likes of HSG and MPCi, completed three launches to SpaceX’s 165 last year, according to BryceTech. One featured a reusable vehicle; it was not successful.

SpaceX and Landspace differ markedly in terms of maturity – SpaceX introduced a reusable rocket in 2010, carries much larger payloads, and though loss-making, is much closer to profitability – yet they are to some extent representative of a modern-day space race.

“Over the past few years, China and the US have turned this sector into a market with clear scenarios, clear plans, and clear numbers. It has broader application scenarios than the low‑altitude economy, and in the short term, robotics,” said Herry Han, founding partner and CEO of China-focused Soul Capital.

Investment opportunities are not limited to these two markets, however. A combination of a broader politicisation of space-tech – as governments recognise the national security implications of a broad range of usage scenarios – and more affordable and accessible hardware have fostered pockets of start-up activity. Asian hotspots include Australia, India, and Japan as well as China.

“Geopolitics has become a major driver accelerating space technology development in Japan,” said Toshiya Kishimura, a partner of Japan government-backed JIC Venture Growth Investments, noting that space has evolved from pure R&D to become a strategic infrastructure domain.

“For a maritime nation like Japan, securing access to space infrastructure is becoming increasingly important from a national resilience perspective.”

Japan Investment Corporation (JIC) made space-tech a key focus area as an extension of its deep-tech practice, which launched in 2022. Private capital made its debut in the industry several years earlier as Japan and other Asian countries broadened investor access between 2014 and 2020.

The impact has been profound. PE and VC investment in Asia Pacific space-tech amounts to USD 5.9bn since 2016, with over half of that deployed in the past three years, according to AVCJ Research. Less than five months into 2026, the full-year record of USD 1.2bn – set in 2024 – is about to be surpassed.

China is the dominant force, having received 62% of investment in the region since 2016, but India, which didn’t register any deal flow until 2022, is a fast riser with 11%. Japan and Australia and New Zealand combined each account for around 9%. Contributions from the rest of Asia are piecemeal.

Dedicated industry funds have emerged as well. Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched a JPY 1tn (USD 6.7bn) fund in 2023 to support reusable rocket technology and satellite innovation. Last year, the INR 10bn (USD 117m) Antariksh Venture Capital Fund and the INR 5bn Technology Adoption Fund (TAF) were established to drive private space investment in India.

Orbital ambitions

Rocket Lab was Asia’s first space success story. The New Zealand-founded company completed its first launch in 2017 and received nearly half of all PE and VC investment in regional space-tech pre-2019. Its backers, which included Khosla Ventures and Bessemer Venture Partners, achieved a liquidity event in 2021 when Rocket Lab merged with a US-listed special purpose acquisition company (SPAC).

The company has completed 80 orbital launches to date, including 18 in 2025, second only to SpaceX among independent players. Rocket Lab trails its US counterpart by most measures. The first reusable vehicle debuted last year, while payloads are sub-300 kg, although work is underway on a vehicle capable of carrying 13,000 kg at lower orbits. SpaceX can carry up to 64 metric tons.

Speaking to AVCJ in 2024 following a AUD 55m (USD 36m) Series D round, Adam Gilmour, founder of Gilmour Space Technologies (GST), observed that Rocket Lab emerged at a time when the market was preoccupied with making satellites as small as possible – almost the size of a shoebox.

“A shoebox-sized satellite is a cheap way to get into space, but you can’t put in a big camera or radio frequency receiver or deploy a lot of solar panels to give you power,” he said. “The market went down in size, then it went up in size. We saw that in the middle of our development, so we designed a rocket that can carry 400 kg. We can launch two satellites for USD 10m instead of one of USD 8m.”

GST recently secured a AUD 217m Series D led by Australia’s National Reconstruction Fund Corporation (NRFC) and Hostplus, but it has yet to complete a successful orbital launch. A breakthrough may come this year. Japan’s Interstellar Technologies and India’s Skyroot Aerospace, which have received private funding of USD 288m and USD 164m, respectively, are in similar positions.

China is arguably home to Asia’s market leaders. I-Space, which saw its total funding surpass USD 1bn in February on closing a CNY 5bn (USD 736m) round, can claim eight orbital launches with a 50% success rate. All were with solid-fuel rockets, though. Its liquid-fuel reusable vehicles remain grounded.

The gulf between SpaceX and its Asian peers is also visible in financial performance. SpaceX’s launch services division generated USD 4.09bn in revenue last year from government and commercial customers. It posted an operating loss of USD 657m and segment-adjusted EBITDA of USD 653m, even after spending USD 3bn on R&D for its next-generation Starship launch vehicle.

Landspace’s IPO prospectus reveals revenue of CNY 36.5m in 1H25 amid a continued dependence on technology-demonstration missions. Net losses for the period amounted to CNY 634.6m, taking the cumulative total since 2022 to CNY 3.4bn.

“From a revenue perspective, commercialisation is still very early. Technologically, China is perhaps 80% of the US capability, but valuations are just a fraction. Chinese technology is absolutely expensive but relatively cheap,” said Wayne Shiong, a managing partner at Argo Venture Partners, and formerly of China Growth Capital, an investor in Landspace.

“Sometimes policy moves first, and so does the money. If you wait for commercial validation and product delivery, you’ve already missed the window.”

Policy permutations

Industry participants are generally positive on government initiatives to encourage private investment in China space-tech. First, commercial space has been elevated to pillar industry status, making a policy about-turn less likely. Second, listing requirements have been relaxed for pre-profit rocket developers. Third, last year China revealed plans to launch 200,000 satellites, suggesting robust demand for launch services.

This has contributed to a deeper competitive landscape, with one investment banker noting there are at least a dozen private rocket developers across two or three tiers. Most focus on low‑ to medium‑orbit launches intended to supplement the work of state‑backed players that for now dominate high‑ to medium‑orbit launches and high‑end applications.

Newer entrants are embracing advanced technologies like methane‑liquid oxygen engines, stainless‑steel airframes, and SpaceX-style reusability technology. For example, Astronstone, which was established in 2024, specialises in high‑payload, low‑cost, rapidly reusable liquid-fuel rockets.

The company recently closed a CNY 500m round, taking its total funding to CNY 1bn, with support from investors such as Gaorong Capital, Hillhouse Investment, Yunqi Partners, and Highlight Capital. Several of these groups were making their first foray into space-tech.

Policy initiatives in other markets take different forms. According to Hiroyuki Kageyama, an investor at Beyond Next Ventures, procurement is the most significant enabler in Japan. The likes of iSpace (distinct from China’s i-Space) and Axelspace – both equipment providers, not rocket developers – went public on the back of government contracts that delivered stable revenue and supported valuations.

Pixxel, an India-founded hyperspectral imaging start-up now headquartered in the US, relies on contracts from North America, Europe, and Latin America for most of its revenue. However, earlier this year, Pixxel, Dhruva Space, PierSight, and SatSure, were selected by the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre to build the country’s first privately led national satellite system.

Hemant Mohapatra, a partner of Lightspeed Venture Partners India, expects more to come on the domestic front. “Next year will be a lot about expanding into our Indian ecosystem, both across satellite building and data, which is what they call businesses,” he said.

Pixxel has raised nearly USD 100m to date from a string of global investors such as Google, M&G Catalyst, and Accenture Ventures. It’s unusual for an Indian deep-tech start-up to have such a diverse shareholder register, according to Sheetal Bahl, a partner of Merak Ventures, but it tallies with the international profile of Pixxel’s revenue base.

GST, meanwhile, is largely supported by domestic investors – VC firms Blackbird and Main Sequence, plus numerous LP co-investors – but not by domestic customers. Gilmour claims to have secured launch contracts and fielded interest from clients in Japan, South Korea, the US, and Europe. The Australian government is notably absent.

“They came into our funding round [via NRFC] for a decent amount of money, and what we’re saying is it’s not just the investment, it’s the purchasing,” Gilmour said in a recent interview with AVCJ. “The Australian government spends a lot of money buying space data and space images and things like that from other companies. We’re saying: Can you be the buyer? Can you be our customer, please?”

Looking for launchers?

Rocket Lab secured more global investors, but Matt O’Connell, an operating partner at DCVC, endorses the notion that it was an opportunity to corner the small launch market at an early stage. US-based DCVC backed Rocket Lab in 2017 and 2018. Since then, it has avoided launch investments, having seen the market become overcrowded. O’Connell contends there is now overcapacity in launch services.

This doesn’t necessarily mean the prospects are bleak for Asian launch players. On one hand, sovereign needs – such as China wanting its own launch capabilities – create a separate regional addressable market. On the other, Asia may have competitive advantages. State support translates into lower cost of capital, while the region has established strength in industrial mass production.

Moreover, there is demand beyond the low Earth orbit segment served by SpaceX. O’Connell points to Astranis, a US developer of geostationary satellites designed to be small yet capable of operating at high Earth orbits. It currently has 10 satellites and has sold more than USD 1bn in contract services.

“An Asian-based launch company could make money for Asian investors. We’re too small to have offices around the world, and because we get so heavily involved in people, we probably would not invest in them,” O’Connell added. “Rocket Lab was different. They said, ‘We’re going to open a US office.’”

Gilmour believes there is room for growth because more launch companies are needed globally. He disagrees with the overcapacity assessment, noting there are only three or four providers in Europe, a couple in the US, and one or two in Japan. New entrants take time to scale production; a company proving launch capability today wouldn’t have 5-10 operational rockets until the end of the decade.

“The misnomer with SpaceX is they can’t take all the market share because of the physics of space. Customers want to go to 24, 36, 48 different places – sometimes with 800 people, sometimes 100, sometimes just 10. SpaceX just keeps building bigger jumbo jets,” Gilmour said.

Perceptions of the total addressable market for Asia-based companies ultimately dictates investor appetite for launch start-ups. A few are willing to make one or two concentrated bets. Being more expansive is difficult given the capital intensity of the industry and small fund sizes. Jun Qu, an investment manager at Main Sequence, argues that one per fund is enough.

Another obstacle is economic sustainability. Lightspeed’s Mohapatra observes that reusability is the clinching factor, regardless of sovereign-linked demand, and he wouldn’t back a company unable to meet this challenge. In this respect, confidence is linked to market maturity.

Soul Capital, an investor in LandSpace, is looking for the next generation of Chinese space-tech start-ups reasoning that the standouts could develop reusable launch vehicles within two years. Rahul Chandra, a managing director at India-based Arkam Ventures, which participated in Skyroot’s recent USD 60m funding round, is more circumspect.

“We need to have enough hardware out first. Following the launch [of Skyroot’s first orbital‑scale vehicle], we expect at least one more exciting launch company to emerge,” he said. “With more on the manufacturing side, the downstream will come in about five years.”

Downstream dynamics

Others are already scouting for downstream opportunities. Nithish Kumar, an investment manager at Speciale Invest, backed India’s AgniKul Cosmos, but he is uncertain about the broader launch market, given SpaceX’s dominance. Rather, Speciale Invest is interested in areas like in-space mobility, positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT), and microgravity manufacturing.

Beyond Next’s Kageyama is of a similar mind. He noted that JAXA’s Space Transport Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) programme was designed to narrow the field and two of the four start-ups initially selected have dropped out. One of those, Space Walker, filed for bankruptcy in February.

ElevationSpace, which is developing an in-orbit transportation network to connect cargo, crew, and orbital operations, is Beyond Next’s sole existing space-tech play. It reflects a preference for in-orbit services and on-orbit manufacturing – areas seen as having lower capital needs and a natural affinity for Japan’s strength in precision engineering.

“Japan hasn’t been very active in the defence market since the Second World War, so we only have a limited budget,” Kageyama said. “We cannot compete with the US or China on budget. But we can compete by being different, by doing unique things.”

While the Chinese market is deeper, it remains a domestic play; there is none of the global-from-day-one pathway to scale favoured by some investors. One Chinese LP observed that heavy domestic exposure represents a risk – there is no guarantee products will be accepted by a state-dominated buyer ecosystem, which could lead to questions being asked about business stability and valuations.

“There is risk around whether the product can actually be delivered and whether SatNet [the state-backed satellite network operator] will buy it,” the LP said. “Rocket companies also have Yuanxin [the broadband satellite constellation operator] as a customer, but for satellite companies, it’s just SatNet.”