Space Investment Outlook

The commercial space economy was roughly 613 billion dollars in 2024 and is projected to roughly triple to 1.8 trillion dollars by 2035, growing almost twice as fast as global GDP (World Economic Forum and McKinsey, April 2024). The growth is not mostly about rockets. The WEF and McKinsey project that more than 60 percent of 2035 demand comes from industries that consume space-enabled data and connectivity (supply chain, defense, food, retail, digital communications) rather than from the launch-and-satellite backbone itself. The enabling shift underneath all of it is reusable launch: the cost of reaching orbit fell by roughly an order of magnitude over the past decade, and in 2025 SpaceX flew 165 Falcon missions, more than the rest of the world combined, while global orbital launch attempts reached about 320, up from 114 in 2020 (planet4589, SpaceNews).

Cheap launch turned space into a set of recurring-revenue businesses: satellite broadband (Starlink passed 12 million customers on June 4, 2026), earth observation sold as subscription data and analytics rather than one-off images, and now direct-to-cell connectivity to ordinary phones. The investible tension is structural. The two dominant players are SpaceX, which completed its IPO on June 15, 2026 (Nasdaq: SPCX), and Blue Origin, which remains private. Beyond SpaceX, public investors access the theme through a younger and much smaller cohort of pure-plays whose FY2025 revenue ranges from Iridium's mature 872 million dollars (pending acquisition by Rocket Lab) down to AST SpaceMobile's 71 million dollars ahead of commercial service. The opportunity is real and durable. Outside SpaceX, the public on-ramp is narrow, government-dependent, and for several names still early in commercial service.

The public universe sorts into archetypes with very different economics and risk. This is framing, not stock picking.

1. Mature cash generator (Iridium, IRDM). About 872 million dollars of FY2025 revenue, profitable, and returning capital. A lower-beta way to own established satellite communications, voice, and IoT rather than the growth frontier. Rocket Lab agreed on June 29, 2026 to acquire Iridium for a notional 54 dollars per share in cash and Rocket Lab stock (about 8.0 billion dollars enterprise value), with closing expected in mid-2027 subject to regulatory approvals (Iridium stockholders approved the deal on September 24, 2026, with about 99.6 percent of votes cast in favor). Iridium also completed its purchase of the remaining 61 percent of Aireon for about 366.7 million dollars on July 2, 2026. If the deal closes, Iridium's standalone listing ends and its cash flow joins Rocket Lab.

2. Launch and space systems (Rocket Lab, RKLB). About 602 million dollars FY2025, scaling the larger reusable Neutron rocket on top of a growing space-systems business, and the pending acquirer of Iridium (announced June 29, 2026, close expected mid-2027), which would add an operating satellite network and L-band spectrum to its launch and spacecraft manufacturing. The closest public analog to owning launch capacity directly.

3. Space infrastructure (Redwire, RDW). About 335 million dollars FY2025. A picks-and-shovels supplier of solar arrays, structures, and in-space manufacturing that has expanded into defense via the Edge Autonomy acquisition.

4. Earth-observation data (Planet Labs PL, BlackSky BKSY). About 308 million dollars (fiscal year ended January 31, 2026) and 107 million dollars (calendar 2025) respectively. Recurring imagery and analytics businesses tied closely to government and defense demand, increasingly international.

5. Lunar and exploration (Intuitive Machines, LUNR). About 210 million dollars FY2025, driven by NASA contracts. Milestone-binary: revenue and sentiment swing on individual lunar missions.

6. Direct-to-cell optionality (AST SpaceMobile, ASTS). Pre-commercial service, with about 71 million dollars of FY2025 revenue, but a very large addressable market. A deployment-and-execution story where the question is whether the constellation comes online on schedule.

7. The launch and broadband giants (SpaceX, Blue Origin). Dominant in launch and broadband. SpaceX is also no longer only a launch and broadband company: it completed its acquisition of xAI (which owns X) on February 2, 2026 and of Cursor on August 14, 2026, and its Super Intelligence segment produced 7,560 million dollars of its 14,575 million dollars of Q3 2026 revenue, against 1,767 million for Space and 5,248 million for Connectivity (SpaceX Form 10-Q, September 30, 2026). SpaceX has been public since its IPO completed on June 15, 2026 (Nasdaq: SPCX); Blue Origin remains private and you cannot buy the equity. Both are tracked here for competitive context, because they frame every other public competitor's economics.

Cross-cutting framing: mature and cash-generative (Iridium) versus growth and early-stage (AST SpaceMobile, Intuitive Machines); heavily government-exposed (BlackSky, Planet, Intuitive Machines) versus more commercial; and capital-light versus capital-intensive. The right question is rarely a head-to-head ticker comparison. It is what return on capital each can earn given SpaceX's scale and its own funding position and end-market exposure.