Why the future of space access must be multi-polar

Satellites have quietly become part of the infrastructure that keeps modern societies functioning.

They help farmers monitor crops and water use, guide ships and aircraft, connect remote communities and provide critical information during floods, fires and other disasters. Governments depend on them for weather forecasting, environmental monitoring, communications and national security.

The World Economic Forum estimates that the global space economy could grow from $630 billion in 2023 to $1.8 trillion by 2035. Much of that value will come not from activity in space itself but from services delivered to people and industries on Earth.

Yet every one of those services depends on a less visible layer of infrastructure: the ability to place a satellite in the right orbit, at the right time and cost.

As satellites become more important to everyday life, the resilience of the systems that carry them to orbit deserves the same attention as the satellites themselves.

Access to space has improved dramatically. Reusable rockets, smaller satellites and standardized rideshare missions have reduced costs and enabled universities, start-ups and emerging space economies to deploy spacecrafts.

However, increasing launch volume is not the same as creating a diverse launch market.

Based on Jonathan McDowell’s General Catalog of Artificial Space Objects (GCAT), our analysis of publicly recorded payload deployments from 2021 to May 2026 found that 77% of payloads in the global comparative sample were carried by one launch-vehicle family.

The analysis excluded Chinese and Russian satellites because consistent public payload-level information is often unavailable, particularly for state-linked and defence missions. Starlink satellites were also excluded to prevent a single megaconstellation from dominating the results.

Even after those exclusions, 1,697 payloads in the sample were launched by the leading vehicle family, compared with 166 by the second-largest.

This concentration is partly the result of genuine technical and commercial success. High launch frequency, reusable systems and predictable rideshare services have expanded access to orbit and enabled business models that might otherwise have been impossible.

The concern is, therefore, that much of the satellite economy may have too few alternatives when disruption occurs.

Once a satellite reaches space, it needs an orbit suited to its purpose.

Altitude, inclination, deployment timing and local solar conditions can influence communications coverage, imaging opportunities, power generation and spacecraft lifetime. A satellite observing a particular region may need a different orbital pathway from one providing broadband connectivity or tracking maritime activity.

However, smaller operators frequently have to design around the launches available to them. On a rideshare mission, the primary customer or standardized route usually determines the deployment orbit.

Secondary payloads must accept that destination or pay for additional propulsion and orbital-transfer services. Our dataset suggests that this is influencing orbital outcomes.

Across the global sample, 58% of payloads were deployed into sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) – which is a near-polar Earth orbit that perfectly synchronises a satellite's path with the sun – compared with 39% into other low Earth orbit pathways. More than half of the payloads assessed as suitable for broader low-Earth-orbit missions ultimately entered sun-synchronous orbit.

This does not prove that every satellite was placed in a technically inferior orbit. SSO is ideal for many Earth-observation missions. However, the clustering suggests that launch availability, rideshare corridors and schedule certainty can narrow practical choice. Over time, missions may be optimized around available routes rather than the orbit that would best serve the user.

Europe has placed sovereignty and strategic autonomy at the centre of its space ambitions. But sovereignty cannot be measured only by whether a region can manufacture a rocket or satellite.

It must also include the ability to launch frequently, recover from disruption and select an orbit that fits the mission.

Europe’s recent experience shows why. Between 2022 and 2024, Ariane 5 was retired, Ariane 6 faced multi-year delays, access to Russian Soyuz launchers ended and Vega-C was grounded after a launch failure. The result was what the European Space Agency leadership and industry observers described as a launcher crisis.

The consequences were strategic, not merely commercial. Galileo, Europe’s satellite navigation system, exists in part to avoid dependence on the US GPS system. Yet during the launcher crisis, Europe launched Galileo satellites on Falcon 9 because it lacked a fully available domestic launch stack.

In our European sample, excluding OneWeb, 76% of payload deployments since 2021 were carried by one launch vehicle. Including OneWeb reduces that share to 54%, largely because the constellation used other vehicles for high-volume deployments. Both views reveal substantial dependence on a small group of pathways.

The orbital pattern is equally striking. Excluding OneWeb, almost 83% of sampled European payloads were deployed into sun-synchronous orbit. Among European payloads assessed as suitable for broader low-Earth-orbit missions, approximately 68% ended up in sun-synchronous orbit.

This matters beyond Europe. Emerging space economies face an even narrower set of options. A country may develop a satellite, train engineers and build a domestic applications sector, yet still depend on foreign schedules, regulations and orbital corridors to reach space.

A multi-polar ecosystem does not mean replacing successful providers or artificially dividing demand. It means ensuring that operators have several credible options across vehicles, regions, schedules and destinations.

Governments can help by qualifying multiple launch providers for public missions, supporting common satellite interfaces and avoiding programmes designed around a single route to orbit. Public procurement should consider redundancy and responsiveness alongside the lowest immediate launch price.

Industry can expand dedicated launches, rideshare services and orbital-transfer capabilities as complementary offerings. More launch sites and regulatory frameworks across regions would also reduce geographic dependence and enable emerging economies to participate in higher-value segments of the sector.

Satellites now support critical services across almost every sector of the economy. The infrastructure that carries them to orbit should not depend on only a handful of vehicles, regions or deployment corridors.

Space sovereignty is not achieved by building one rocket. It is sustained by never needing just one.