16.12.2025

Chinese companies are no longer hiding their intent to clone SpaceX. They’re advertising it.

A rendering of the "Starship-1" rocket by Beijing Leading Rocket Technology Co. Credit: Beijing Leading Rocket Technology Co.

Every other week, it seems, a new Chinese launch company pops up with a rocket design and a plan to reach orbit within a few years. For a long time, the majority of these companies revealed designs that looked a lot like SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.

The first of these copy cats, the medium-lift Zhuque-3 rocket built by LandSpace, launched earlier this month. Its primary mission was nominal, but the Zhuque-3 rocket failed its landing attempt, which is understandable for a first flight. Doubtless there will be more Chinese Falcon 9-like rockets making their debut in the near future.

However, over the last year, there has been a distinct change in announcements from China when it comes to new launch technology. Just as SpaceX is seeking to transition from its workhorse Falcon 9 rocket—which has now been flying for a decade and a half—to the fully reusable Starship design, so too are Chinese companies modifying their visions.

Everyone wants a Starship these days

The trend began with the Chinese government. In November 2024 the government announced a significant shift in the design of its super-heavy lift rocket, the Long March 9. Instead of the previous design, a fully expendable rocket with three stages and solid rocket boosters strapped to the sides, the country’s state-owned rocket maker revealed a vehicle that mimicked SpaceX’s fully reusable Starship.

Around the same time, a Chinese launch firm named Cosmoleap announced plans to develop a fully reusable “Leap” rocket within the next few years. An animated video that accompanied the funding announcement indicated that the company seeks to emulate the tower catch-with-chopsticks methodology that SpaceX has successfully employed.

But wait, there’s more. In June a company called Astronstone said it too was developing a stainless steel, methane-fueled rocket that would also use a chopstick-style system for first stage recovery. Astronstone didn’t even pretend to not copy SpaceX, saying it was “fully aligning its technical approach with Elon Musk’s SpaceX.”

And then, on Friday, the state-aligned China.com reported that a company called “Beijing Leading Rocket Technology” took things a step further. It has named its vehicle “Starship-1,” adding that the new rocket will have enhancements from AI and is billed as a “fully reusable AI rocket.”

It’s worth noting that, unlike the government’s Long March 9 vehicle, most of the Chinese startups are starting with smaller versions of the Starship vehicle, which makes sense because it is completely impractical for a startup to build a super heavy lift rocket out of the gate.

Success may not be in the cards for most

Many of these launch startups will not grow past the PowerPoint phase, of course. The US commercial launch industry went through a similarly euphoric phase about a decade ago, albeit with a far greater diversity in rocket design, when there were dozens of startups. Only a small handful eventually reached orbit.

Although the mechanics of the fundraising market in China are different from capital markets in the United States, investors are nonetheless driven by the prospect of growth and long-term profits. For this reason it makes sense to emulate the most successful US launch company, SpaceX, and its forward-looking technology, Starship. Chinese startups are telling investors they can become the SpaceX of China, and the most obvious way to do this is to build similar rockets.

But it is anyone’s guess whether the Chinese startups can get a Starship working. SpaceX is still in the development phase of its super heavy lift rocket, after all.

And whether Starship’s design will scale downward remains an open question. Building a smaller Starship is not necessarily easier than a large one, and the design may not work below a certain threshold. For example, when US-based Stoke Space sought to tackle full and rapid reuse with a smaller launch vehicle, the company opted for a novel upper stage and heat shield that is completely different from SpaceX’s pathway for a super heavy lift rocket.

Quelle: arsTechnica