China’s Space Pioneer is preparing for the maiden launch of its Tianlong-3, a vehicle similar in design, size, and payload capacity to the Falcon 9, just over a year since the dramatic static fire of its first stage. This is set to be the first of several commercially developed reusable launchers set to make their debut before the end of the year.
Across the private sector, companies are moving forward with new launch vehicles and reusable hardware, such as Space Epoch, which has now successfully fired an engine that was previously flown and recovered from a splashdown. Meanwhile, iSpace has launched China’s first droneship to support propulsive landings at sea.
Despite a slow start to the second half of the year, Chinese launch cadence increased towards the end of July, with four launches inside as many days. These included a successful return to flight for iSpace’s Shuang Quxian‑1 (or Hyperbola 1) – a vehicle which had suffered a fourth stage anomaly on a previous mission earlier in the month and now sits on a 50% success rate across eight flights.
iSpace’s Shuang Quxian‑1 (Hyperbola 1) launches Kunpeng-03 from Site 95A at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (Credit: iSpace)
The series of launches also notably included the second for the new Chang Zheng 12 (CZ-12) rocket, this time carrying its first batch of Guowang internet satellites.
Launches for the megaconstellation began back in February but had flown two months apart until recently. Missions have dramatically ramped up with three batches being lofted to low-Earth orbit (LEO) inside eight days in late July and early August, spread across three different launch vehicles. A late July launch aboard a Chang Zheng 6A from Taiyuan carried five satellites, while a Chang Zheng 8A and the aforementioned CZ-12 lofted a further nine satellites each.
The state-owned China Satellite Network Group, or SatNet, has deployed 57 of these satellites to date, with reports that it plans to launch around 400 by the end of 2027. The eventual constellation is expected to grow to 12,992 satellites. This will be made up of 6,080 in the low orbit GW-A59 sub-constellation at altitudes below 500 km, offering initial broadband coverage. The rest will orbit in the higher GW-A2 sub-constellation at 1,145 km, providing a more global reach.
Guowang was first registered with the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in 2020, a regulatory body with which radio frequency spectrums are reserved. The ITU requires companies to complete their constellations within seven years of launching their first satellite, and to reach various milestones in between, or risk losing rights to the frequency. Amazon’s Kuiper constellation faces similar expectations as it endeavors to deploy half of its constellation by the end of July 2026 to satisfy its license with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
Chang Zheng 6A launches the SatNet Group 05 mission from LC-9A at the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center (Credit: Weibo user / Peoples Daily)
A rival constellation, Qianfan (‘Thousand Sails’, also known as G60), is operated by SpaceSail in Shanghai. It has similar ambitions to eventually grow to around 14,000 satellites. SpaceSail currently has 90 satellites in orbit to date, launched in five batches of 18 spacecraft. Both megaconstellations aim to compete with Starlink in size and reach, but remain limited, for the time being, by the current bottlenecks in launcher availability and the speed of manufacturing the satellites. New commercially developed vehicles are edging closer to their debut launches, while some satellites are being manufactured by more than one company.
The most recent batch of Guowang satellites was the first to be produced by Galaxy Space, for example, and the first time that a commercial aerospace company had mass-produced these satellites. Galaxy Space reports that it has ramped up its automated production line to shorten the satellite development cycle by 80%.
Reliable mass production will be critical, as illustrated when only five of the 18 Qianfan satellites in the second batch reached their intended orbital altitude last October. The Quinfan satellites are manufactured by the Shanghai-based Genesat, which was also new to high-volume production and is committed to producing hundreds of the satellites in a new state-supported factory in the Songjiang district. Genesat’s facilities, inaugurated last December, are said to be capable of producing one satellite per day.
Chang Zheng 12 launches for the second time, carrying the first batch of Guowang satellites to be manufactured by Galaxy Space (Credit: Galaxy Space)
SpaceSail will need a significant number of launches to reach its deployment goal of 648 Qianfan satellites by the end of this year. This ambition was first announced back in November 2023 and will allow it to begin a regional service before the network scales up further between 2027 and 2030. Although the ITU’s ‘bring-into-use’ rules state that 10% of the constellations’ satellites should be in place by the end of next year, the operators are likely to request an extension as this amounts to around 1,300 satellites and would be unachievable at the current pace.
July’s CZ-12 launch was also the second from the Commercial LC-2 pad at Wenchang’s commercial spaceport, operated by the Hainan International Commercial Aerospace Launch Company (HICAL). The only previous launch from this pad was the debut launch of the CZ-12 last November.
It lies adjacent to the Commercial LC-1 pad, which was built specifically for the Chang Zheng 8 (CZ-8) and its enhanced CZ-8A variant. To date, this has also launched only two missions. The most recent, flown by a CZ-8A had been expected to take place in May but was rolled back from the pad two days before launch. It finally lifted off on July 30, carrying SatNet’s Group 06 batch with nine Guowang satellites.
Render of the marine recovery ship which CCCC Dredging Technology and Equipment National Engineering Research Center recently won a contract to construct (Credit: HICAL)
Sea-based launches have also been sparse this year, with only two launches from Chinese coastal waters in the first half of the year. Galactic Energy launched three Yunyao satellites aboard a Gushenxing-1S (Ceres 1S) in May, and is currently working on both an upgraded Gushenxing 2 solid rocket and preparing its kerolox-powered Zhishenxing-1 (Pallas-1) for a debut by the end of the year. Chinarocket had also lofted ten satellites aboard a Jielong 3 in early January, and this week will launch an undisclosed payload from a sea platform aboard a second Jielong 3 on August 8.
Moving from sea launches to planning infrastructure for future sea recoveries, the CCCC Dredging Technology and Equipment National Engineering Research Center recently won a contract to construct a marine recovery ship to support landings and recoveries of rockets. Like SpaceX’s fleet of droneships, the vessel will not be self-propelled but will employ stationkeeping to maintain an accurate position. It will operate in waters roughly 300 to 700 km offshore from the Wenchang Satellite Launch Center in Hainan province.
iSpace shared a video in early August of a colorful launch ceremony for its own droneship, dedicated to the Shuang Quxian‑3 (or Hyperbola-3) rocket, as it took to the seas for the first time. The Xīngjì Guīháng Hào, which roughly translates to ‘Interstellar Return/Homecoming’, left the Runyang Shipyard in Yangzhou on Aug. 5. Once further outfitting is completed in Jishui, it will undergo sea trials near Hainan in September.
iSpace’s droneship for the Shuang Quxian‑3 (or Hyperbola-3) shortly after its launch ceremony (Credit : iSpace)
At 100 m in length, it is slightly longer than the droneships in SpaceX’s fleet, but its width of 42 m is 20% narrower. It has a larger deck area, measuring approximately 60 m by 40 m. The autonomous ship will utilize a DP2 dynamic positioning system for stability at sea, though it remains unclear whether the vessel will feature a mechanism akin to SpaceX’s Octagrabber to secure boosters after landing.
Construction continues on pads LC-3 and 4 at the HICAL site, which will eventually extend to eight launch pads in the future. According to plans announced last October, a second commercial spaceport will be built within 100 km of the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, with one billion yuan of capital invested in the project. Construction has yet to begin, and no formal timeline or pad count has been released so far.
The current Xichang launch site has two active fixed launch pads, nestled in the hillsides of the southern Sichuan mountain region, and also supports responsive launches of the Kuaizhou-1A from a mobile launcher. On the last day of July, this four-stage vehicle lofted a Chinese-built Earth observation satellite for Pakistan’s Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (SUPARCO) into low-Earth orbit. The satellite will support disaster management, agricultural and urban planning, and national security.
An Expace Kuaizhou 1A launches from Xichang carrying Pakistan’s PRSS-01 satellite on July 31, 2025 (Credit: Expace)
New CNSA Regulation
The China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced its Regulation on Strengthening Quality Oversight of Commercial Space Projects in late July. This mandates full lifecycle quality oversight of commercial space activities, from design and development through to launch, recovery, or final decommissioning of spacecraft. This additional regulation requires all private space companies to demonstrate end-to-end compliance, introducing standards, emphasizing accountability, and improving risk management in China’s accelerating private space sector.
While not cited, the likely catalyst for this was Space Pioneer’s static fire anomaly just over one year ago on June 30, 2024. The first stage unexpectedly broke free from its test stand during the test at Gongyi, flew uncontrolled for several hundred meters, and crashed in the nearby mountainous area. This caused a dramatic explosion, but fortunately, no casualties.
Space Pioneer has since detailed over one hundred improvements made to the vehicle’s structure, engine section, and other systems to mitigate this. The company also worked with the CNSA to implement many other procedural improvements, which the new regulation appears to formalize.
The improved engine section of the Tianlong-3 in the assembly building (Credit: Space Pioneer)
Tianlong-3 nears Maiden Launch
One year on, rehearsals have been completed in readiness for the launch of Space Pioneer’s Tianlong-3 as it prepares for its maiden launch, potentially in September.
Tests of the pad and infrastructure at the company’s own facility within the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in July used a mockup vehicle simulator. These verifications ranged from the horizontal transportation of the vehicle from the assembly building to raising it vertically on the pad, and validating connectivity to the ground service equipment.
The two-stage Tianlong-3 is very similar in size, design, and payload capacity to SpaceX’s Falcon 9. Its nine Tianhuo-12 (‘sky fire’) engines burn the same mix of liquid kerosene, also known as RP1, and liquid oxygen and can produce up to 8,000 kilonewtons of thrust. Space Pioneer is initially planning to recover and refly its boosters up to ten times. To support this, the first stage has four grid fins to guide it back to Earth, while four retractable landing legs will be used in later flights for propulsive landings.
Tianlong-3 launch rehearsals using a simulator on the transport erector (Credit: Space Pioneer)
Tianlong-3 is one of several commercially developed rockets that are expected to debut this year and are designed to be reusable. The list also includes CAS Space’s Lijian-2 (Kinetica-2) and Landspace’s stainless steel ZhuQue-3, both of which have been targeting an end-of-September maiden launch.
The Lijian-2 is a little smaller in height and diameter than a Falcon 9, while the 4.5-m diameter ZhuQue-3 is a step larger with more thrust, thanks to the nine reusable Tianque‑12A engines, which burn liquid methane and oxygen in a gas-generator cycle.
Meanwhile, iSpace has conducted load-bearing tests on the 17-m liquid methane tank for its Shuang Quxian‑3 (SQX-3, or Hyperbola-3) as it progresses towards an end-of-year debut. The 4.2-m diameter tank was manufactured in-house using the company’s proprietary friction stir welding production line and was filled with cryogenic liquid nitrogen for these tests using various load profiles.
The Shuang Quxian‑3 (Hyperbola-3) first-stage methane tank is prepared for its cryogenic load testing (Credit: iSpace)
Space Epoch steps toward reusability
Space Epoch has successfully test-fired the Longyun-70 engine from its Yuanxingzhe-1 vehicle, which was recently recovered from the Yellow Sea. The stainless steel prototype took its first low-altitude test flight on May 28, lasting around 125 seconds and reaching around 2.5 km in altitude. It completed the flight with a controlled descent, reigniting its engine for a hover and a soft vertical splashdown off the coast of the Shandong Province, after which it was recovered and towed to shore.
Translating to “Dragon Cloud”, the Longyun engine uses a gas-generator cycle and burns liquid oxygen and methane as propellants. It supports multiple restarts with the ability to throttle down to 30%. The engine was reported to have achieved 100% thrust during the 100-second test.
The demonstrator vehicle measures 26.8 m in length and has a diameter of 4.2 m. It carried a 20 kg payload of example packages from e-commerce partner Taobao to verify that the cargo bay successfully protects payloads from the vibration, mechanical loads, and thermal exposure of launch, and is resistant to fire and moisture. The final vehicle will have a volume of over 120 square meters for the potential delivery of commercial payloads, and a capacity of up to 6,500 kg to Sun-synchronous orbit.
Space Epoch fires a previously flown and recovered Longyun-70 engine (Credit: Space Epoch / Arrow Technology)
While the vehicle body is also currently undergoing inspection, this test firing is a significant step towards demonstrating the vehicle’s reusability. The company aims to conduct the Yuanxingzhe-1’s first orbital launch and sea recovery by the end of the year and has ambitions to launch up to 25 times annually.
(Lead image: Tianlong-3 simulator at the launch pad during launch rehearsals – Credit: Space Pioneer)
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