China’s commercial space industry is no longer simply trying to put satellites into orbit. It is beginning to sell what comes after launch: complete systems, operational support, training and practical applications. A deal with Thailand this week offers an early example of that strategy, as Beijing-based GalaxySpace deployed what it described as China’s first turnkey satellite export to a Southeast Asian customer.
GalaxySpace said it launched the Lingzhi-09 Thailand CubeSat aboard a Long March-6C rocket from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Centre in Shanxi province on Tuesday, alongside six other satellites. Developed for Thailand’s Geo-Informatics and Space Technology Development Agency, or GISTDA, the satellite is intended to collect remote-sensing data for land, agriculture and ecological applications while also providing practical training for Thai university students.
The significance of the mission, according to GalaxySpace, lies not simply in the satellite itself. The company developed, launched and deployed the complete spacecraft in orbit for a Southeast Asian customer as a packaged solution. It described the mission as the first occasion on which a Chinese commercial space company had provided such an integrated service to a customer in the region.
That model represents a shift in how Chinese commercial space companies are approaching overseas markets. GalaxySpace provided GISTDA with the spacecraft, a ground system and personnel training. Thai personnel received training in China, while GalaxySpace later dispatched teams to Thailand to assist with construction and testing of the ground system.
Yang Kuan, an associate professor at Beijing Institute of Technology and deputy director of its Institute of Aerospace Policy and Law, described the direction of the industry to the Beijing-based Financial News as a movement away from “exporting products” towards “exporting services and ecosystems”. Satellite technology, in this model, becomes an end-to-end service rather than a piece of hardware delivered to a foreign customer.
The Thailand mission therefore comes at a significant moment for China’s commercial space sector. The industry is expanding its satellite constellations while seeking overseas markets, increasingly placing it in competition with Elon Musk’s SpaceX and its Starlink project. Chinese companies are attempting to establish commercial relationships across regions that extend well beyond China’s borders.
SpaceSail, a Shanghai-based company that has recently completed a record funding round for China’s satellite sector, has secured approval to provide satellite communications services in Brazil and is exploring markets including Malaysia, Thailand and Kazakhstan. Geely-backed Geespace has conducted satellite communications trials with telecoms operators in more than 20 countries across the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia, Central Asia, South Asia and Latin America.
The geographical reach is striking, but the ability of Chinese companies to sustain such expansion depends on a more fundamental issue: the cost and availability of rocket launches.
China’s satellite manufacturing industry is considered relatively mature, according to an unnamed industry expert cited in the source material, but the shortage of inexpensive launch capacity remains a constraint. Some Chinese launch services can cost around US$20,000 per kilogram. A February report by the Mercator Institute for China Studies put the comparable cost for SpaceX’s reusable Falcon 9 at roughly US$2,700 to US$3,000 per kilogram.
The disparity illustrates one of the central challenges facing China’s commercial space ambitions. Building satellites is only one part of establishing a competitive space industry. The satellites must also reach orbit at a price that makes commercial expansion viable.
There are signs, however, that this gap may be narrowing. Private Chinese rocket maker LandSpace successfully recovered the first stage of its Zhuque-3 rocket on land this month, marking China’s first successful ground-based recovery of an orbital-class booster. That achievement followed the successful sea-based recovery the previous month of the first stage of a state-developed Long March-10B using a net.
Reusable rockets are therefore becoming an increasingly important part of the competitive equation. The cheaper and more frequently rockets can be launched and recovered, the stronger the economic foundation for satellite constellations and the services built around them.
GalaxySpace itself illustrates how quickly China’s commercial space industry has developed. Founded in 2018, the company had launched more than 40 spacecraft by early this year, according to Peter Huang, its general manager for international business development, who spoke to Bloomberg in February.
Thailand forms part of GalaxySpace’s wider overseas strategy. Huang said the company was working with telecommunications and space companies in Thailand and elsewhere to validate its technology and identify “real world use cases”. The emphasis is significant: rather than simply selling satellites abroad, the company is attempting to establish applications and operational relationships that can demonstrate how its technology works in actual markets.
That approach also gives the Thailand mission a significance beyond a single CubeSat. The satellite is designed not only for remote-sensing applications involving land, agriculture and ecology, but also for training Thai university students. GalaxySpace’s involvement in building and testing the ground system means the relationship extends from the spacecraft itself to the infrastructure and personnel required to operate it.
China’s commercial space companies are simultaneously seeking the financial resources required to accelerate this expansion. GalaxySpace has begun preparations for an A-share listing this year, joining commercial space firms including LandSpace, Galactic Energy and Spacety in seeking access to China’s capital markets.
The resulting picture is of an industry moving on several fronts at once: satellite manufacturing, launch technology, overseas partnerships, communications services and access to capital. Each part of the system is connected to the others. Satellites require launches; launches require affordable rockets; commercial services require customers; and international expansion requires companies capable of providing more than hardware.
The Thailand agreement provides a concrete example of that emerging model. Rather than exporting a satellite alone, GalaxySpace exported a complete package that included the spacecraft, ground infrastructure and training. It is a relatively small mission in physical terms, but it demonstrates the direction in which China’s commercial space sector says it is moving.
The larger contest is already visible. SpaceX has established a formidable benchmark through reusable launch technology and satellite communications, while Chinese companies are expanding their own capabilities and searching for customers across Southeast Asia, South Asia, Central Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Middle East.
For China’s private space companies, the challenge is therefore no longer confined to reaching orbit. It is increasingly about building an international market once they get there. The Lingzhi-09 mission to Thailand suggests that Chinese commercial space firms are beginning to treat that market not as a distant possibility, but as an export opportunity.
