ULA General Discussion Thread

[Jim]

It is not "uninformed bias" to assert that the entire procurement system is structured to benefit ULA.

Ok, it is just uniformed.  Have you worked a government launch service procurement?

[thespacecow]

The facts are ultimately this:

-1) The United States has the lowest cost basis for launch on the planet
-2) The United States military does not share this cost basis advantage, because the government procurement process currently prioritizes corporate welfare for politically connected entities (ULA) over cost.
-3) China will soon match the current day US cost basis
-4) The Chinese military will access this cost basis
-5) Unless #1 and #2 are reconciled, the US will have a significant space asset capacity disadvantage to China.
-6) Reconciliation above kills ULA

We go all in on reuse or China kills us. Even just semi-reusable will soon just bring rough parity, only leveraging full reuse brings overmatch.

We don't have the luxury of doing things the way we used to anymore... It's not just space launch. There are bright red warning lights blasting in the economic-military-industrial sphere and people are just stuffing their heads in the sand.

I agree with the general direction of this comment, but unfortunately I don't think 6) follows from 1) to 5). What will happen - in fact what is already happening - is US will use a dual lane approach (in fact it's 3 lanes) which will preserve the big fat payloads for ULA while at the same time invest in low cost constellations (which is just SpaceX at this point, so once again SpaceX saves the day).

3 Lanes:
1) Starshield: Take full advantage of low cost launch, doesn't even go through NSSL for launch. Less than $10M per satellite including launch
2) SDA: This is basically using the bloated government procurement process for constellation, ~$50M per satellite not including launch. Using NSSL Phase 3 Lane 1 for launch, so somewhat lower launch cost but still not commercial price, let alone Starlink price.
3) Billion dollar payloads: This is still happening (e.g. Next-Gen OPIR) and would use NSSL Lane 2 for launch. This will preserve some payloads for ULA (until New Glenn takes it over)

[thespacecow]

Why buy a company that provides a service at a cost far above market prices? Just launch with SpaceX and Blue Origin instead, or RocketLab Neutron when they come online.

Buying a company just for employees and facilities and asking them to redesign their product from scratch is not worth it.

Because you're always going to be paying the other company's profit margins. You may even be competing against them directly in the market you operate in. Amazon Kuiper may be paying more but the strategic benefit of independence versus a competitor is valuable in the long-run. SpaceX will be building orbital data centers too. In the worst case, your launch provider may even file regulatory complaints against you because they compete in the same space you do.

We don't know what ULA's actual costs are or what their profits per launch are. Buying them can get you a captive launch provider and you retain control over your launch costs, if not already below market price.

And even if that requires a redesign, nothing is ever truly from scratch. The experience ULA has, their manufacturing and integration facilities, their work force, these have value. Only on internet forums do people view rockets as some trivial thing you can cook up. Mind you, we have yet to see any of the new medium-lift entrants fly yet and I'm not sure if we even will in 2026.

It's just amusing to me, as I've seen several posts of this nature so far, that people are so convinced ULA has no value and that starting from scratch is a better proposition. If your goal is to launch a couple rockets, sure, ULA is too big and comes with too much baggage. If your goal is to scale to launching thousands of tons of orbital compute each year, then ULA's existing assets become useful.

ULA has nothing to offer in terms of launching orbital AI data centers, literally ZERO.

This doesn't mean they wouldn't get bought by some (or one particular) AI company since the leader of that company is not too bright. But it's a spectacularly bad idea, much worse than Amazon's dumb idea to avoid Falcon 9. It'll be fun to watch this train wreck though, so I'm all for it. If you think USSF is annoyed with ULA for Vulcan delays now, wait until ULA delays USSF payloads so that they can launch some AI compute lol.

[DreamyPickle]

I believe high payload integration costs are entirely downstream of high payload costs. If your payload costs $600M and the whole launch process add $60M on top of the rocket cost then it's really not that much, not compared to the cost of losing the payload.

Very very expensive payloads will continue to be built. Switching entirely to lower cost payloads is not going to happen soon (if ever) and is not a threat to the ULA business model.

The big threat to ULA is that there are two other providers.

[ThatOldJanxSpirit]

It's just amusing to me, as I've seen several posts of this nature so far, that people are so convinced ULA has no value and that starting from scratch is a better proposition. If your goal is to launch a couple rockets, sure, ULA is too big and comes with too much baggage. If your goal is to scale to launching thousands of tons of orbital compute each year, then ULA's existing assets become useful.

I believe that one of the most important lessons of the last decade is that if your goal was to scale to launching thousands of tons of anything each year, then starting from scratch was the only viable option.

[sstli2]

It's just amusing to me, as I've seen several posts of this nature so far, that people are so convinced ULA has no value and that starting from scratch is a better proposition. If your goal is to launch a couple rockets, sure, ULA is too big and comes with too much baggage. If your goal is to scale to launching thousands of tons of orbital compute each year, then ULA's existing assets become useful.

I believe that one of the most important lessons of the last decade is that if your goal was to scale to launching thousands of tons of anything each year, then starting from scratch was the only viable option.

Only one company is launching thousands of tons a year. A good portion of the companies starting from scratch have yet to launch anything into orbit at all. Several are going to fail before they approach anything near a thousand tons a year. There is an insufficient sample to draw any such conclusion.

It takes infrastructure and assets to scale, and ULA has that in droves. Thus, it has value. But sure, if you want to start out of a garage, scrape together pennies of VC funding, and roll the dice on reaching the pad once at all without your rocket blowing up, then feel free to make that bet. I wouldn't, and tech CEOs likely wouldn't, either.

[XRZ.YZ]

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/2004615163731918966

ARC
@ARC2282

Tory congrats but PLEASE look into reusability more 🙏🙏🙏

Tory Bruno
@torybruno
I left ULA solidly on that path. Up to them now

[meekGee]

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/2004615163731918966

ARC
@ARC2282

Tory congrats but PLEASE look into reusability more

Tory Bruno
@torybruno
I left ULA solidly on that path. Up to them now

Left ULA with a path to reusability?!

If he's still talking SMART he's just blowing smoke in their face. Insult to injury.

Jesus can you imagine how folks are feeling there rn?

"Captain goes down with his ship" has never applied to corporate execs in any industry, ever.

[zubenelgenubi]

"Captain goes down with his ship" has never applied to corporate execs in any industry, ever.

Strawman writ large.
(Family owned business can be an exception.)

[StraumliBlight]

Lockheed Martin Q4 Financial Results & Transcript [Jan 29]

Operating profit decreased 4% compared to Q4 2024, due to lower equity earnings from United Launch Alliance (ULA), partially offset by the higher sales volume. Turning to the full year, sales increased 4% to $13 billion, driven by higher volume on NGI, FBM, and Orion programs, partially offset by a decrease for National Security Space programs due to program lifecycle, the overhead persistent infrared (OPIR) missions. Operating profit increased 10% to $1.3 billion in 2025, primarily resulting from favorable at-complete performance on certain commercial civil space programs during the first half of the year, as well as the higher overall sales volume. The increase was partially offset by lower ULA equity earnings.

Space's segment operating profit margin for the full year 2025 was 10.3%.

[sstli2]

Is there any color on whether ULA itself is net income positive? Lockheed's mixing of ULA's financials with the rest of their space segment makes this unclear, as I imagine their other businesses are solidly profitable.