"Haven Demo satellite integration and test campaign for launch in Q1 2025" - is this some separate pathfinder launch?
The launch of their first commercial space station, Haven-1, is currently scheduled for NET Q4 2025.The first crew will launch to Haven-1 approximately three months after the station’s deployment.
Delayed to Q4.https://www.linkedin.com/posts/maxhaot_the-future-of-commercial-space-missions-activity-7263646996786216960-5F0N?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
Vast and SpaceX announced a joint request for research proposals from the global space science community aimed at advancing long-term human habitation and exploration in space. Building on their established partnership, the two companies seek high-impact research projects to support humanity on Earth and advance our capacity to live and work in Earth orbit and beyond. Submitted proposals will be evaluated based on scientific and technical merit, feasibility, and alignment with mission objectives. Approved research proposals will be able to leverage the capabilities of the Haven-1 Lab, Dragon spacecraft, and/or private astronaut missions to the International Space Station (ISS). Haven-1 is scheduled to be the world’s first commercial space station and crewed microgravity research, development, and manufacturing platform. This groundbreaking facility will enable cutting-edge research and technological advancements, opening new frontiers in space science.“The Haven-1 Lab provides a revolutionary platform for advancing collaborative efforts in science, research, and in-space manufacturing innovation. By partnering with the scientific community, we aim to build on the invaluable legacy research on the ISS, enabling pioneering research to address real-world solutions and pursuing transformative research opportunities to address and eventually overcome some of the most critical health and scientific challenges of space exploration—challenges that also hold the potential to improve life on Earth,” said Vast CEO, Max Haot.While no direct funding will be provided to the research project, Vast and SpaceX will offer selected researchers access to a hosted orbital laboratory, on-orbit crew time, and support for project design and flight qualification—at no cost.This initiative reflects Vast’s and SpaceX’s dedication to fostering collaboration with the global scientific community and international partners. By providing access to microgravity environments to the broader scientific community, Vast will gain valuable experience working with partners in an operational orbital station that will be incorporated into the design and architecture of Haven-2–the proposed successor to the ISS.
Jan 29, 2025Here is the latest as we build the team, facilities, and hardware to launch the world’s first commercial space station. Every step brings us closer to redefining space exploration. Stay tuned for more milestones as we make history. We are proud to bring space station primary structure manufacturing back to the United States. 🇺🇸
Vast Passes Critical Haven-1 Test MilestoneFebruary 6, 2025[...]At Vast, transparency is a core value. We believe in sharing accurate, realistic timelines with our team, potential hires, partners, customers, and the public as soon as practical. Keeping everyone informed fosters trust and alignment across all stakeholders.When we launched the Haven-1 program, we set a target of launching no earlier than August 2025, giving ourselves a two-year, three-month development window.With the completion of our primary structure qualification test and a fully assembled team, we now have greater clarity on our build and launch schedule. As a result, we are updating our timeline:[...]
Haven-1 is scheduled to launch no earlier than May 2026.
The company based in Long Beach, California, aims to launch its single-module Haven-1 space station on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in May 2026. To that end, it completed both its primary structure and qualification article and is moving into manufacturing the flight version.“We’ve locked the design, we’ve released those drawings to our manufacturing CNC shop and we are welding it with a view to start integration and complete the flight primary structure by the end of July,” said Vast CEO Max Haot. “So, a lot more visible progress. We are just finishing out control room now. The team is there, everybody’s focused and locked in on it and we’re getting it done.”[...]A Vast spokesperson confirmed on April 28, 2025, that both the Oxygen Pressurization Demonstration and Large Window Pressure Test milestones were successfully completed and said others, like the Air Revitalization Characterization Test, are also in the books.“We’re progressing on track aligned with our scheduled launch of Haven-1 in May 2026. We will complete the manufacturing and testing of the flight primary structure in July 2025 and later in the summer, we’ll launch Haven Demo, an in-orbit testbed for critical space station technologies and qualified hardware and software,” the Vast spokesperson said.“From July-December 2025, we’ll complete the vehicle integration and checkout, including subsystem manufacturing and testing. Then the environmental test campaign (acoustics, vibration, EMI, TVAC) will take place at NASA’s Glenn Research Center at the Neil Armstrong Test Facility from January-March 2026 before the final step of pre-launch operations and planning.”
The Haven-1 flight article has been painted. Next, key components including the hatch and domed window will be integrated ahead of pressure and load testing in Mojave, CA.
Two Haven-1 primary structures, the qualification and flight article, side by side at Vast headquarters in Long Beach, California. All built in-house. 🇺🇸
Another milestone completed. The Haven-1 primary structure, including the hatch and domed window, has completed pressure and load acceptance testing in Mojave, CA. Next up: final weld inspections and integration in our clean room.
Radiator vibration testing is underway for Haven-1. At our Long Beach facility, we’re qualifying this critical system to ensure it can withstand launch vibrations and reliably shed heat from the station’s internal cooling loops.
Vast@vast·Simulating station operations on the ground is fundamental to building Haven-1 hardware and improving flight safety. Earlier this month, we tested @GoToImpulse Saiph Thruster on our multi thruster vacuum stand. Haven Demo flew with 3 thrusters and Haven-1 will operate 48.
Vast@vast·The twelve deployable solar array wings for Haven-1 (flight units) are undergoing acceptance inspection at Vast HQ.
Vast Advances Haven‑1 Into Integration PhaseJanuary 20, 2026[...]Based on the current integration timeline, Vast is updating its schedule for Haven-1 to be ready to launch Q1 2027.[...]
The last four tweets - within the past two months - are all about qualifying components. How should this launch in 2026? It is still a long way to integrate and qualify the whole thing.
Vast, the company developing next-generation space stations, announced that integration has begun on Haven-1. Scheduled to be the world’s first commercial space station, Haven-1 is designed as a standalone, crewed station and serves as the first step for Haven-2, a multi-module station capable of supporting a continuous human presence in low-Earth orbit (LEO) that is Vast’s proposed successor to the International Space Station (ISS). Haven-1 is an integral part of the company’s hardware-rich development approach that is putting flight-hardware and systems through rigorous ground and in-space testing to accelerate learning, reduce technical and schedule risk, and unlock new commercial and government capabilities in LEO. Haven-1 is designed to expand access to space and provide an affordable platform for microgravity research, manufacturing, and both national and international space infrastructure.The first phase of Haven-1 integration includes installation of the station’s pressurized fluid systems, including thermal control, life support, and propulsion system tubes, and component trays and tanks. These systems will undergo pressure, leak, and functional testing. The second phase of integration will incorporate avionics, guidance, navigation and control systems, and air revitalization hardware. The third and final phase will complete the vehicle with crew habitation and interior closeouts, exterior micrometeoroid and orbital debris (MMOD) shielding, thermal radiator installation, and solar array integration, bringing Haven-1 to a fully flight-ready configuration. Vast remains focused on completing integration and conducting a suite of system environmental tests at NASA’s Neil Armstrong Test Facility later in 2026.Based on the current integration timeline, Vast is updating its schedule for Haven-1 to be ready to launch Q1 2027. Haven-1 is contracted to launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. With each milestone, the team gains more data and greater certainty, enabling timelines to become progressively more precise. Haven-1 represents a true zero-to-one development, and as Vast moves on to its second, third, and subsequent stations, schedule precision will continue to improve as systems, processes, and integration maturity increases. Throughout this process, human safety remains the team’s top priority, with development and manufacturing pace carefully balanced to ensure mission integrity.“From the beginning, our business plan has been about building a sustainable future in orbit, one that meets today’s market while creating the foundation for what comes next,” said Max Haot, CEO of Vast. “Haven-1 is not a concept; it is real, flight-tested hardware designed to carry forward a continuous human presence in low-Earth orbit for America and its allies. By vertically integrating design, manufacturing, testing, and operations, we’re moving with both speed and autonomy. Haven-1 brings the next era of space stations within reach and helps ensure there is no gap in our ability to live and work in space beyond the ISS.”Vast’s hardware-rich, stepping-stone approach accelerates development while improving safety and reducing cost by building, testing, and flying systems early. This is reinforced by Vast’s vertically integrated model, which has already delivered a 10X reduction in primary structure manufacturing costs compared to traditional space station programs, while increasing capability, improving schedule certainty, and shortening manufacturing timelines.Haven-1 Development: Recap of 2025 MilestonesThroughout 2025, Vast completed a series of major Haven-1 milestones, advancing the station from component-level development to a fully qualified flight structure. In October, Vast installed and completed fit verification of the passive docking system on Haven-1, confirming mechanical alignment, and interface compatibility with visiting crewed spacecraft.Haven-1’s fully tested passive docking adapter (flight unit) mated to the Haven-1 flight structure.In late 2025, Vast conducted acceptance testing of the Haven-1 flight primary structure, culminating in full-scale pressure testing at Vast’s testing site in Mojave, California. The flight primary structure was pressurized beyond nominal operating conditions to validate structural margins, weld integrity, and leak performance, marking a critical step toward human-rated operations. The Haven-1 primary structure represents the second primary structure Vast has completed in one year and demonstrates the company’s leadership in returning space station manufacturing and testing to the United States after more than two decades.Vast is now the only operational commercial space station company to have successfully flown and operated its own spacecraft in orbit. On November 2, 2025, Haven Demo, an in-orbit testbed for key space station technologies and the first step in our stepping stone approach, achieved mission success. Through Haven Demo, core systems, including power, avionics, ground systems, propulsion, and guidance, navigation, and control, were validated in space, directly informing the final design of Haven-1.
