Rocket Lab’s Neutron rocket won’t fly until the end of the year, the New Zealand launcher announced Thursday in its 2025 earnings.
During earnings announcements in years past, CFO Adam Spice tied the company’s profitability to its ability to begin flights of the medium-lift rocket, which was expected to first fly as early as 2024 when first announced. So, an update that Neutron’s inaugural flight would be pushed back to Q4 2026 is a rough sign for the rest of the year.
Delays, however, should be contained to the single component—the fuel tank—which ruptured during a test in January. CEO Peter Beck said that the extra time to requalify a new tank, and a new, faster method to build that tank, would mean quicker ramp up of Neutron missions after flight one.
“The way to think about follow-on flights, it’s not quite as dire as moving all of the follow-on flights 12 months,” Beck said. “We’re already building—flat out—additional Neutron tail numbers, so it’ll probably be a slightly faster convergence into subsequent flights because none of the other hardware that’s qualified has been halted.”
Bigger picture: Despite the disappointing Neutron news, the New Zealand launcher posted its strongest year yet. Rocket Lab flew a record 21 Electron missions in 2025, and notched a new record cadence of seven launches in Q4 alone.
Some high level stats include:
- $179.7M in Q4 revenue, +36% YoY
- $601.8M in FY2025 revenue, +38% YoY
- Record backlog of $1.85B, +73% YoY
- FY 2025 net loss was a record $198.2M, +4% YoY
Two other publicly traded space companies—Redwire and BlackSky—also released their 2025 earnings this week. While the results varied, there were similarities among the companies—record-breaking stats in at least one category while reporting larger net losses compared to the year before.
Redwire facts and figures:
- $108.8M in Q4 revenue, +56% YoY
- $335.4M in FY2025 revenue, +10% YoY
- Record backlog of $411.2M, +39% YoY
- FY2025 net loss of $226.6M, nearly double YoY.
- Projecting 26 revenue between $450-500M
BlackSky by the numbers:
- $35.2M in Q4 revenue, +16% YoY
- Record $106.6M FY2025 revenue, +4% YoY
- Backlog of $345M, +32% YoY
- FY2025 net loss of $70.3M, +23% YoY
- Projecting annual revenue of $120-$145M in 2026
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Green energy is all the rage in Europe, and the trend is beginning to reach beyond the stratosphere.
ISPTech—a German startup developing in-space propulsion systems reliant on non-toxic fuel—announced a €5.5M seed round today to ramp up its production of green spacecraft thrusters.
The new capital will also help the company grow its workforce, and build a new in-house test facility to increase ISPTech’s production rate (from about four or five prop systems annually, into the dozens) by the end of the decade, according to CEO Lukas Werling.
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