The road from the drawing board to the launch pad had been long and humbling for Europe’s new heavy-lift Ariane 6 rocket, which successfully blasted off on Tuesday, July 9th, from Europe’s spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, with small satellites and experiments from various space agencies, private companies, and universities.

The Ariane 6 re-ignitable Vinci upper stage, the most innovative part of the rocket's problem-riddled development, successfully fired twice before dispersing satellites across low Earth orbit. Before the planned and final burn, however, its auxiliary power unit (a device that pressurizes the stage's tanks) shut down prematurely. As a result, the third burn, needed to complete a de-orbit maneuver didn't take place, and the stage, instead of heading into the atmosphere to burn up in line with ESA's 'no space clutter' commitment, remained in orbit 600 kilometers above Earth.

The hiccup, described by ESA and ArianeGroup execs in a post-launch conference as minor blemish in an otherwise flawless debut, won't affect the schedule of future launches.

"A completely new rocket is not launched often, and success is far from guaranteed. I am privileged to have witnessed this historic moment when Europe's new generation of the Ariane family lifted off – successfully – effectively reinstating European access to space,” said ESA's Director General Josef Aschbacher.

But the celebration can’t undo the humiliation Europe experienced as it struggled to get its new flagship launcher off the ground. Years of delays in the 5-billion-euro program meant that the supply of the predecessor rocket, Ariane 5, had run out before Ariane 6 was ready for business. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, which ended the use of Russia’s medium-lift Soyuz launcher at Europe’s Kourou spaceport, and the 2022 failure of Europe’s light-weight Vega rocket, exacerbated the fiasco.

For one year, Europe was left without its own access to space, dependent on Elon Musk’s SpaceX, whose ambitions to make rockets reusable were not taken seriously by ArianeGroup executives. Over the past decade, SpaceX, indeed, has shown Europe that complacency is a trap as it pushed the European behemoth off its throne as the undisputed leader of the global launch market.

“As recently as seven years ago, Arianespace were the dominant player in the international launch market,” Dallas Kasaboski, a principal space industry analyst at global technology consultancy Analysys Mason, told Supercluster. “They controlled 30 to 40% percent of the market. Even more in some years.”

In 2014, Europe’s heavy-lift workhorse Ariane 5, developed in the 1980s, blasted off from its South American launch-pad six times, lifting ten giant telecommunications satellites into geostationary orbit (the orbit at an altitude of 22,000 miles where satellites appear suspended above a fixed spot on the equator). That year, the rocket also sent the final European-built automated cargo vehicle Georges Lemaître to the International Space Station.

SpaceX’s medium-lift Falcon 9, in the fifth year of operations at that time, too, launched six times that year — twice with supplies for the International Space Station, three times into geostationary orbit and once with a batch of small satellites heading to low Earth orbit. 

That very same year, the council of ESA member states approved the development of Ariane 6. The new rocket, according to ESA, was to “maintain Europe’s leadership in the fast-changing commercial launch service market.” At the same time, a new company called ArianeGroup was established that formalized the partnership between Europe’s main rocket makers Airbus and Safran into a joint venture. The restructuring involved the handing over of Arianespace, the provider of European launch services, from the French space agency CNES to the new firm. Later, the teething problems at the new company would be blamed for a string of delays that resulted in Ariane 6’s debut flight lifting off four years after the intended date.

The new rocket was to be expendable — one use only — consisting of two stages powered by the environmentally friendly combination of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. The main innovation being the Vinci upper stage that could be reignited up to five times to disperse satellites at different altitudes. Ariane 6 was to come in two varieties — the medium-lift Ariane 62 with two strap-on solid boosters, perfect for low Earth orbit missions, and the more powerful, four-booster Ariane 64 intended for launches of heavy satellites into geostationary orbit. The main goal was to reduce launch cost by at least 40% compared to Ariane 5 to keep up with SpaceX’s aggressive drive for lower pricing.

“When ESA approved Ariane 6, the idea was to slash costs and be more competitive,” Maxime Puteaux, principal adviser at space industry consultancy firm Novaspace, told Supercluster. “But the issue is that Ariane 6 is more or less Europe’s answer to Falcon 9 as it was 10 years ago. Falcon 9 that we know today is very different — much more powerful, much more reliable and innovative thanks to reusability.”

In fact, SpaceX’s reusability efforts began showing results soon after Europe’s decision to make Ariane 6 expendable. In December 2015, one year after the fateful meeting of ESA member states, Elon Musk’s space firm landed Falcon 9’s first stage on a pad at Cape Canaveral for the first time. Since then, SpaceX has nailed about 330 booster landings and gradually increased the number of uses of a single Falcon 9 first stage to the current maximum of 20 flights. SpaceX is already working to certify the Falcon 9 first stage for up to 40 uses.

Talking to the  Financial Times in 2020, former ESA Director General Jan Wörner said that developing a reusable rocket was deemed too challenging and costly at that time, and couldn’t be justified by the relatively low demand for guaranteed European institutional launches. Analysts agree that the case for reusability wasn’t persuasive back then. The satellite market, at that time, was dominated by large, mono-block spacecraft with lifespans of 20 years or more that Ariane 5 was optimized for. The smallsat revolution, with its concepts of mega-constellations and the idea of replacing cheaper satellites with more modern tech every few years, was only beginning to shape up.

“I think the initial decision and the initial reasoning for the decision was sound,” said Kasaboski. “When SpaceX was coming around, reusability was very, very ambitious and far away kind of technology. Most players in the space sector did not have the ability to support themselves to develop it. And the expectation was for the satellite market to remain as it was. They did not expect that high, rapid turnaround that we now see in the low Earth orbit.”

By 2015, however, it became clear that the tide was turning. Satellite makers began receiving fewer orders for large geostationary telecommunication satellites that used to be the bread and butter of the satellite and launch industry. 

“The geostationary telecommunications market started to collapse in 2015 because the end users were no longer watching satellite broadcast TV and no longer buying subscriptions,” said Puteaux. “The launcher market at that time was in full panic on whether or not their demand will be there and how it will be supplied.”

A cohort of New Space smallsat makers came to the launcher market’s rescue. But they wanted something more than was being offered. They needed flexible and cheaper opportunities to launch in bundles with other missions. SpaceX quickly responded to the trend (which it itself helped to foster the development of its Starlink constellation), offering launches for dozens of smaller satellites on its Transporter ride-sharing missions. With the expansion of the New Space sector, the number of launches booked by commercial customers began to creep up. At this stage, Kasaboski thinks, ESA and Arianegroup should have paused to think.

“Although the initial decision made sense, there must have been a window where the configuration of Ariane 6 could have changed direction,” he said. “It might still have left them behind and over budget, but maybe they would be in a position to be a bit more competitive.”

Things were only bound to get worse for ArianeGroup. While SpaceX kept marching ahead, soon landing one booster after another and making strides toward Musk’s dream of a behemoth fully reusable Starship, the European rocket manufacturer began postponing the Ariane 6 debut launch. The triumphant first-attempt debut flight came four years after schedule, making the rocket look even more past its sell-by-date. 

Puteaux points out that while Ariane 6 was designed to compete with Falcon 9, it will now face an even mightier competitor in the form of the Starship. “The Ariane 6 debut flight comes in a world where Starship has already flown four times,” he said. “Who would have thought five years ago that it would happen this way and not the other.  The question is, how much Starship will eat Ariane 6’s lunch.”

ESA defends its position by arguing that Ariane 6 missions may differ from what Starship will be used for. "Honestly, I don’t think Starship will be a game-changer or a real competitor, said Toni Tolker-Nielsen, ESA director of space transportation In an interview with Space News. "This huge launcher is designed to fly people to the moon and Mars. Ariane 6 is perfect for the job if you need to launch a four- or five-ton satellite. Starship will not eradicate Ariane 6 at all."

Talking to the French newspaper Le Monde in December 2023, the newly appointed CEO of ArianeGroup Martin Sion attributed the delays in Ariane 6 development to the challenges faced by the newly established company when integrating its various sub-units. He also claimed the company struggled with the lack of skilled engineers after the retirement of the Ariane 5 generation.

Puteaux and Kasaboski, however, trace the problem to the European way of doing space business. 

“Europe has a very strong industrial base that's often institutionally focused and it is often very difficult to change direction,” said Kasaboski. “America's ability to fail quickly and iterate in many cases works very well. It works quickly, and you move to the next thing, and there you go.”

Puteaux added: “Ariane’s history has always been about giving Europe independent access to space. This objective is still valid. But we are experiencing the limits of this approach now because we’re no longer in a world where people are developing launchers for sovereignty purposes only but rather to make money on top of it.”

He adds that the ESA principle of geo-return (a rule that guarantees member states to get their worth of contribution into ESA back in the form of industrial contracts) and the influence of member states on where subcontracts go is an additional obstacle to efficiency. 

“ArianeGroup, because of the geographical return, doesn't get to choose its contractors,” said Puteaux. “It’s dictated by other member states, selecting, putting money to the program, hence designating with whom the contractor or integrator is forced to work with. When a contractor is not at risk of being fired and being replaced by someone else, there are no incentives in moving fast and being efficient and innovative.”

Among the main blows to ESA and ArianeGroup ahead of the debut launch of Ariane 6 was the decision by the European weather satellite operator Eumetsat, announced on June 29th, to launch its new flagship geostationary satellite on SpaceX’s Falcon 9. The satellite, Meteosat Third Generation-Sounder 1 (MTG-S1), was scheduled to launch on one of the upcoming Ariane 6 launches in early 2025.

The 340-million-euro- per-year subsidy, which ArianeGroup secured from ESA member states last year to keep Ariane 6 launch cost down, drew further criticism.

Despite the setbacks, Kasaboski and Puteaux agree that the market “wants and needs Ariane 6.” Arianespace has a backlog worth of 3 billion euro of Ariane 6 launches, according to Puteaux, with the Amazon Kuiper and OneWeb constellations being among its most significant customers.

The question is, how long is Europe’s new rocket going to stay. Puteaux, for one, doubts, it will live up to the benchmark set by its predecessor Ariane 5, which kept launching satellites for 27 years. 

“I don't think that Ariane 6 will live as long as Ariane 5,” said Puteaux. “I think that it's a kind of transition rocket for maybe 10 years. I think we might soon see either a replacement being developed or new competitors to emerge in Europe.”