Securities Times: "Trial and error" in commercial spaceflight is indispensable; the growth potential is worth safeguarding

Recently, after Tianbing Technology’s Tianlong-3, a privately run commercial launch vehicle, ignited and lifted off on its first test of the one-stage commercial transport rocket, it experienced an anomaly. The flight test failed to fully achieve the predetermined mission objectives. This setback brings the public a clear view of the real-world reality that commercial spaceflight is high-risk and highly challenging. At a time when the industry is densely entering a phase of technical breakthroughs, timely lessons and reflection are indispensable; meanwhile, the public should also show greater tolerance for the necessary “trial and error,” leaving more room for growth to support the high-quality development of commercial spaceflight in China.

Today, the entire commercial spaceflight sector has moved as a whole from the early stage of validating flights, into a concentrated phase of tackling higher technical complexity such as greater payload capacity and reusability. In this stage, the scale of systems integration has expanded significantly, and the degree of engineering coupling has increased markedly. Against this backdrop, in the past two years, several major private rocket companies have encountered setbacks during their development or launch processes.

Failure is not something to be afraid of. More important than “a successful first launch” is building an efficient technology iteration mechanism—by accumulating data through repeated flight tests, exposing problems, optimizing solutions, and ultimately forming a mature technical system that meets the needs of China’s space industry.

Looking globally, technology trial and error is a common rule in the development of commercial spaceflight. Before SpaceX achieved large-scale success with the Falcon 9, its early Falcon 1 had failed three consecutive times during early launches. As the next-generation heavy reusable rocket, Starship also experienced multiple explosions during its test flights. Even so, founder Elon Musk publicly affirmed the stage-by-stage progress, defining it as “successful failure,” emphasizing that test data and technological advancement matter.

From a more macro perspective, it is necessary to maintain strategic resolve toward technical setbacks in the development of commercial spaceflight. Commercial spaceflight is an important part of China’s “new infrastructure” in space, shouldering crucial missions such as high-density, low-cost launches for tens of thousands of future satellites. 2026 is the first-launch year for reusable rockets. From April to December, multiple companies, including Blue Arrow Space, Galaxy Power, and Interstellar Glory, will conduct dense first launches and reusability verification. Domestically, private commercial spaceflight has clearly planned 22–27 launches. In this process, the necessary “trial and error” should be met with greater tolerance, and the industry’s room to grow deserves protection. Only by facing risks squarely, embracing trial and error, summarizing lessons, and continuously optimizing and improving can commercial spaceflight progress from “able to fly” to “reliable and scalable,” achieving a leap in capabilities at a higher dimension.

（Source: Securities Times）