Rocket Lab is an end-to-end space company and launch service provider, specializing in small satellite launches with its Electron rocket, which has launched 63 times as of April 2025. They are also developing the larger Neutron rocket for constellation deployment. Rocket Lab provides complete space solutions including satellite design and manufacture, spacecraft components, and on-orbit management, serving commercial, civil, and defense markets, with major partners including NASA and the US Space Force. Key products include the Electron and Neutron rockets, Photon satellite bus, and various satellite components.
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Rocket Lab’s release states the EscaPADE spacecraft will launch on a NASA-provided commercial launch vehicle in 2024.
Rocket Lab won a contract from the Space Sciences Laboratory of the University of California Berkeley on 2021-06-15 to begin design work on a new version of the Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (EscaPADE) mission to Mars.
Research, Science and Innovation Minister Megan Woods established New Zealand’s first government-funded space mission to measure methane emissions from space with the help of Rocket Lab earlier 2021.
In March 2021 Rocket Lab launched a mission dubbed Gunsmoke-J on behalf of the U.S. Army’s Space and Missile Defense Command.
Rocket Lab has won a contract that may send two of its spacecraft on a mission to Mars in 2024.
Rocket Lab uses the Electron rocket’s kick stage as a transfer vehicle and has modified it into the Photon satellite bus.
Rocket Lab plans to launch its medium-class Neutron rocket from Wallops using the existing Pad 0-A and to manufacture Neutron at a facility to be built nearby.
Rocket Lab built Launch Complex 2 adjacent to Pad 0-A at Wallops Island for its Electron rocket.
Rocket Lab announced plans to build Neutron, a medium-class vehicle capable of placing 8,000 kg into low Earth orbit.
Rocket Lab spent about $100,000,000 to reach orbit with its Electron rocket.
Rocket Lab has successfully replicated the 2021-05-15 failure in testing and determined it required multiple conditions to occur in flight.
Rocket Lab operates the Electron small rocket and plans to develop a larger Neutron vehicle to compete with SpaceX’s Falcon 9.
Rocket Lab resumed launches nearly two months after the July 2020 failure.
Rocket Lab has indicated its smallsat Venus mission could launch as soon as 2023.
Rocket Lab developed the Electron small launch vehicle and the Photon satellite bus and plans to develop a medium-class launcher called Neutron.
The National Reconnaissance Office has launched satellites on SpaceX and Rocket Lab rockets under commercial contracts in recent years.
Rocket Lab's Electron rocket failed to reach orbit on 2021-05-15 when the vehicle’s computer system detected a problem with the second stage engine and shut it down.
Peter Beck, chief executive of Rocket Lab, is methodically working through the review process and is confident in a swift and reliable return to flight with minimal impact on Rocket Lab’s launch manifest 2021.
The Electron first stage splashed down under parachute after the 2021-05-15 launch and a recovery team placed it on a boat to return to Rocket Lab’s factory.
Rocket Lab plans to merge with Vector Acquisition Corporation, a special purpose acquisition company, and the merger announcement occurred on 2021-03-01 with a goal of completing the merger in the second quarter of 2021.