ULA Atlas 5 launch of the Space Force X-37B space plane in May 2020.

WASHINGTON: The space economy continued its decade-long expansion in 2019, growing more than $9 billion to hit $423.8 billion, according to Space Foundation. This represents a 2.2 percent increase from the 2018 estimate of $414.75 billion.

Of course, these figures come from before the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. But the Space Foundation’s second quarter issue of The Space Report also found that despite the pandemic, launches for the first half of 2020 — from Jan. 1 to June 30 — held steady with the rates for previous years, with 41 successful launches. The five-year average for the same time period is 43.

That said, the research found a mix bag of job losses and jobs gained from December 2019 to May 2020.

“In 12 North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes that have some broad affiliation with the space industry, U.S. job losses from December 2019 to May 2020 totaled 241,600, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Two NAICS codes more specific to the space industry — Guided Missiles, Space Vehicles and Parts (NAICS Codes 336414,5,9) and Search, Detection and Navigation Instruments (NAICS Code 334511) — have grown by 1,400 jobs during the same time.”

Tracking the space economy is a difficult exercise because satellites not only perform a number of functions, and the downstream economic contributions are myriad — such as the market in data analytics services and smart phone apps. Thus, different analysts use different metrics, resulting in divergent findings.

For example, in March, the Space Industry Association (SIA) in its annual “State of the Space Industry” report estimated the global space economy in 2019 at $366 billion, up 1.7 percent over 2018. The US accounted for $114 billion, about 42 percent, SIA found.

According to the Space Foundation report, governments worldwide “collectively contributed $86.9 billion to the global space economy in 2019, a 1 percent increase over 2018 and a 16 percent increase over the previous decade.

But, in keeping with recent trends, it is commercial industry that is leading the economic boom in space. The report found that commercial revenue grew to $336.89 billion in 2019, up 6.3 percent from $328.86 billion in 2018. In addition, the number of global spacecraft on commercial missions during 2019 increased 48 percent from 2018 — from 170 in 2018 to 251 in 2019.

Within commercial space, the two biggest sectors are space products and services, and space infrastructure and support industries, the report finds:

  • Space products and services totaled $217.72 billion, up 1.7 percent from 2018’s $214.18 billion.
  • Space infrastructure and support industries climbed to $119.17 billion, a 16.1 percent increase over 2018’s $102.66 billion and marking the first time since 2016 that the sector exceeded the $100 billion mark.

As with other economic analyses of the space sector, the Space Foundation research also shows off the incredible boom in the global space economy over the past decade. Those 10 years have seen the number of working satellites on orbit rise from some 986 in 2009 to some 2,460 active satellites at the end of 2019, a figure that’s growing every day. The Space Foundation’s analysis shows a whopping 73 percent increase in global economic revenue between 2009 and 2019: from 245.06 billion to 423.8 billion.

The two markets driving that boom in recent years have been Earth observation, particularly by small satellite constellations, and the telecommunications market, in particular broadband services.