Recently, Oriental Space, which successfully carried out the first flight of "Gravity 1", officially announced that the company has completed nearly 600 million yuan in Series B financing. This round was invested by new institutions such as Liangxi Science and Technology Innovation Industry Fund of Funds (managed by Bohua Capital), Shenyin Wanguo Investment, Hongtai Fund, Xinding Capital, etc., with the continued support of old shareholders such as Shanxing Capital, CMBC International, Dinghe Gouda, etc., and Taihe Capital as financial advisor. This is the "Gravity 1" after creating the world's largest solid launch vehicle, China's largest civilian launch vehicle, China's first strap-on civilian and commercial launch vehicle, the world's first sea-launched strap-on launch carrier rocket and many other records, the capital market with realistic "real money" to make the "vote with your feet" action, behind the confidence of Oriental Space to continue to expand the "aerospace commercial cake".
Since the end of 2023, when the Central Economic Work Conference proposed to build a number of strategic emerging industries such as commercial aerospace, the successful first flight of Gravity-1 is undoubtedly the first to submit an answer sheet that satisfies all walks of life. After all, this launch mission has achieved the first flight of three "Yunyao-1" meteorological satellites and the counterweight of the main structure of the low-cost cargo spacecraft weighing 3 tons, achieved the carrying capacity of 6.5 tons in low earth orbit, verified the sea mobile launch and rapid emergency launch plan of medium-sized carrier rockets, and explored a new model of "scale, convenience and low cost" for domestic commercial aerospace.
With both "efficiency and benefit", the commercial value of the first flight of Gravity 1 is highlighted
The commercial value contained in the first flight of Gravity-1, to put it bluntly, is that through efficient and precise R&D and manufacturing, combined with one-stop convenient launch layout and sea launch mode, the rocket has changed from the original scientific research "test product" to a replicable and large-scale "mass product", and then the commercialization of aerospace has changed from testing water to application, increasing the profitability of the upstream and downstream industrial chain of aerospace.
The commercial aerospace "entered" the fast lane, an important driving force comes from the explosive growth of commercial satellite application demand, that is, the three major satellite systems of communication, navigation and remote sensing in the traditional sense. In particular, the satellite Internet for the new generation of communication infrastructure and the current widely used remote sensing series of satellites have an urgent need to establish satellite constellations and open up the "low-orbit satellite economy". However, in the context of the increasing shortage of space frequency and orbit resources, it is undoubtedly a top priority to quickly help commercial satellite companies enter space and expand the construction of space infrastructure in the short term.
As the first rocket in Dongfang Space, "Gravity-1" has a 500-kilometer SSO carrying capacity of 4.2 tons, which can realize "one arrow and one orbit" and "one arrow and one half orbit" of 100-kilogram satellites. At the same time, the first flight of Gravity-1 adopts the sea launch mode with high technical difficulty but high-frequency launch potential, and superimposes the advantages of Gravity-1 as a solid rocket that can be stored in advance and respond quickly to launch, and the follow-up single launch ship can support 24 hours to support one launch mission a week.
From the design of Gravity-1, the layout of rocket infrastructure, the movement of key links of the rocket, and other all-round optimization of efficiency and cost issues, and fully learn from the experience of the civilian industry to reduce the unit launch cost of Gravity-1 to the excellent level of international commercial aerospace. If Gravity-1 takes the form of "carpooling", according to the altitude of 500 kilometers, compared with the current use of small rockets to carpool, the unit price can be reduced by about 50%. It is more economical to launch it through the "whole arrow".
The new model of "scale, convenience and low cost" verified by Gravity-1 will undoubtedly help the rapid implementation of the continental commercial satellite constellation networking, occupy frequency and orbit resources, and open the road of sustainable development of aerospace commercial application from the core transportation capacity.
600 million yuan financing "at the beginning of the year" to further optimize the layout of commercial aerospace
It is understood that the 600 million yuan financing of Dongfang Space will be used for the research and development and production of the "Force-85" 100-ton liquid oxygen kerosene engine, and accelerate the development of the "Gravity-2" medium and large recyclable liquid launch vehicle.
Since its establishment in 2020, Dongfang Space has been facing the mainstream, building a "master", developing a series of "Gravity" rockets with medium and large carrying capacity, and in accordance with the development idea of "coexistence of solid and liquid, step-by-step, effective iteration, and system innovation", it will take about two years to achieve the first flight of "Gravity-2". With the main characteristics of recyclability, extreme cost performance and high-orbit launch, Gravity-2 will further increase the carrying capacity to 15-20 tons, reduce the launch cost to the level of SpaceX's "Falcon 9", and meet the needs of large-scale satellite Internet constellation networking and medium- and high-orbit launches. Through the strategic assembly plant and launch site agglomeration layout, the construction of a "one-stop" sea launch mode, with higher frequency potential, but also laid the foundation for subsequent offshore recovery.
"Gravity-2" will use the "Force-85" engine developed by Dongfang Space, which has completed the semi-system hot test in December 2023 and will complete the full-system test in the first quarter of this year. Dongfang Space will build an aerospace power headquarters in Liangxi District, Wuxi City, covering an area of about 121 acres, and after the completion of the park, it will meet the annual output of 300 "Force-85" engines and support the flight of 30 "Gravity-2" rockets per year. Relying on the strong advantages of the industrial base of the Yangtze River Delta, Dongfang Space strives to build a supply chain and production chain that allows rockets to change from "experimental products" to "mass products", and further reduce the cost of rocket launches.
The Oriental Space team said: "As a new quality of productivity, we will continue to spare no effort to expand and build large-scale, convenient and low-cost 'gravity' launch services. At present, we have made the 'Gravity-1' solid launch vehicle the largest in the world, and we are confident that the 'Gravity-2' liquid launch vehicle will reach the world's leading level, give full play to the important role of commercial aerospace in promoting the development of the aerospace industry, and serve the overall situation of building a space power." ”