After making history as the fastest commercial space launch company to reach orbit in 2021, the Alameda, California-based Astra Space and its leader, Chris Kemp, are hoping to rewrite the economics of the rocket equation with the inaugural launch of their revolutionary ‘Rocket 4’ in early 2027.
If successful, the hybrid rocket design, which combines the latest technological advances with a fifty-year-old innovation, could offer a critically backlogged commercial launch industry a reliable new low-cost alternative.
How a 7-Year-Old Future Astra Space CEO Fell in Love with Rockets
“Never has there been a bigger demand for launch than there is today,” Astra Space founder and CEO Chris Kemp told The Debrief in a one-on-one interview. “A dedicated launch that gets your satellite where it needs to go simply does not exist. You’re waiting years, and it’s very expensive.”
In that same discussion, Kemp explained that his passion for rockets started at a young age when his family moved to Huntsville, Alabama. There, the young upstate New York transplant saw his first bona fide Saturn 1b rocket up close at a Tennessee state-line offramp.
By age seven, the fascinated youth was already building what he described as his own rocket-engine manufacturing facility in his backyard.
“My parents were very concerned,” the surprisingly down-to-Earth company leader half-joked. “I dug a giant hole in the backyard, put sandbags around it. I mixed my own propellant in a rock tumbler, put one of those little plastic swimming pools (underneath), and I filled it up with water so if the thing exploded, the water would collapse into the hole and not burn the neighborhood down.”
Although his career path would take the bold, yet safety-minded rocketeer in a different direction, Kemp said his years in the computer industry did little to hamper his enthusiasm for space. After “several” decades, he said he made a life-altering decision that set him and his future Astra Space team on a path toward commercial space launch history.
“I ended up selling a company and joining NASA,” Kemp told The Debrief.
Five Years to Orbit and Five Years to Scale
After several noteworthy accomplishments, including stints as NASA’s youngest senior tech engineer, NASA’s youngest Chief Information Officer at Ames Research Center, and the first Chief Technology Officer at NASA Headquarters, Kemp once again turned his attention to rockets. In 2016, he established Astra Space.
Within a short time, the commercial launch startup born of a childhood passion began conducting real-world rocket tests. By 2021, the company made history, reaching orbit with its inaugural Rocket 1.
“That was so exhilarating,” Kemp recalled of the historically rapid achievement, matched only by the multi-billion-dollar SpaceX. “We built by far the least expensive rocket that’s ever reached orbit.”
At a cost of “just over one million dollars,” Kemp acknowledged that the accomplishment was noteworthy, especially compared to their well-financed competition. However, he also conceded that a single high-profile event doesn’t show the industry that you can do it repeatedly for the same low cost, and at scale.
“A good friend of mine once said, ‘Scale is what makes innovation matter,’” Kemp told The Debrief. “You can do something that’s really cool, but if you are not able to do it at scale, no one cares. It’s just a science project”
How the Astra Space Team is Rewriting the Commercial Rocket Equation
In terms of calculating how much propellant is required to lift a payload into orbit, scientists use a handy formula called the rocket equation. While mathematically complex, the equation comes down to one simple reality: adding weight to a launch requires more fuel, but adding more fuel adds more weight, which requires more fuel.
For Astra Space, that equation led to initial issues with their earlier-generation rockets. According to Kemp, the main problem was that the engines on Rockets 1, 2, and 3 depended on electricity.
“Those engines were (all) electrically fed turbopump engines,” he explained.
As the company started to envision increasing its rocket’s thrust, it realized that it would need larger and larger batteries. Unfortunately, Kemp noted, “as batteries get emptier, they don’t get lighter.”
“That becomes a problem for your rocket equation,” he told The Debrief. “The engines just could not get powerful enough because of the battery packs. It was an architecture problem.”
After deciding the team needed to scrap the engine design that had literally propelled them from a small start-up to record-breaking history maker, Astra Space’s engineers began searching for options. Kemp said they explored several variations, including some “exotic work” on Raptor engines.
“We asked, what is the most optimal rocket engine that has ever been designed in the history of humanity?” Kemp said with a slight smile as he recalled the moment.
50-Year-Old Design Leads to the 2027 Vision for ROCKET 4
After conducting an exhaustive search, the Astra Space team settled on a 50-year-old rocket design first developed by the Ukrainians. Critically, the legacy engine eliminated the need for batteries and the components supporting the electrically fed engine used in earlier generations.
“(It’s) a pretty elegant design,” Kemp told The Debrief.
Unlike an electrically fed rocket engine, the ‘old-is-new’ design uses high-pressure gas to spin up the turbopump from the ground.
“So it’s running,” Kemp explained while mimicking the turbopump’s sound.
Once the launch team lights the engines and the rocket lifts off, the high-pressure gas line is disconnected. However, instead of using electricity to keep the turbopump spinning, the classically inspired Rocket 4 design uses pressurized gas funneled directly from the combustion chamber.
“So, this engine, it doesn’t stop running,” Kemp explained.
The design also emphasizes simplicity. Kemp told The Debrief that the engine has a single shaft and a single turbine, with no batteries. Perhaps more critically, the new design makes the rocket equation work for the company’s new launch vehicle, not against it.
“In turbopumps, the thing that turns the engine is the fuel, and as the fuel gets used up, the rocket gets lighter,” the Astra Space leader explained matter-of-factly. “So, A, it’s very inexpensive, B, it’s very simple, and C, it’s very reliable.”
How Building a Rocket Can Be Like Building a Soda Can
When detailing how the company can compete with commercial launch standard-bearers like SpaceX and Rocket Lab, Kemp pointed to the impressive accomplishments of older companies in his industry.
However, the steely-eyed CEO, who has successfully guided his team through the rocket industry’s high-profile ups and downs, also challenged the prevailing ‘wisdom’ that huge, expensive, reusable rockets are the only viable option for commercial space launch customers.
“It’s not quite as clear that there isn’t another answer,” Kemp told The Debrief.
To illustrate the company’s broader vision, the Astra Space leader reached for an unlikely analogy: an ordinary soda can. Its low manufacturing cost makes it economical enough to use once and discard, he explained, suggesting that orbit-capable rockets could eventually be produced according to a similar model.
“If you think about a soda can, it costs a couple of cents,” Kemp explained. “Well, if you think about a rocket, it’s just a big empty can of fuel with some mechanical parts that turn that fuel into kinetic energy.”
“It’s a tube with a pointy end,” he added.
Kemp said that this ‘soda can’ model reflects the company’s broader vision of scalable, low-cost daily space delivery, adding that Astra Space hopes to make “hundreds of rockets per year.”
“We chose not to do what a lot of other companies are doing,” Kemp told The Debrief. “We’re not making a reusable rocket. We’re not making a very expensive engine cycle where the engines are very, very expensive. We’re trying to build a soda can.”
“Throwing” 1,000 Dollars a Kilogram of Cargo into Orbit
When asked how the soda-can approach could translate into lower costs for commercial launch customers, Kemp pointed to the capabilities of Astra’s new rocket. Although it is “not much more expensive” than the history-making version that carried a 75-kilogram payload in 2021, he said, the new vehicle “can throw a thousand kilograms.”
“If rockets at a modest production rate can cost a million dollars, and we can throw a thousand kilograms, that’s a thousand dollars a kilogram!” the even-keeled CEO explained, his voice only slightly raised for the first and only time during the conversation.
For comparison, Kemp told The Debrief that competing companies are “currently selling launches for 25k to 35k per kilogram.”
“That is a 30x difference, right?” Kemp said.
Although an exact date for the inaugural launch of Rocket 4 has not been set, Kemp told The Debrief that they are on pace for a “Q1” 2027 take-off. He even noted that the lack of an available launch pad was more likely to cause any delays than the readiness of its high-tech, soda-can spacecraft.
“We’re a nine-year-old competing with a bunch of 20-year-olds, and we’re about to produce a rocket that we are very proud of,” he explained of the nearly imminent launch.
When reflecting on the decade-long path and lifetime-long passion that brought him and his “truly dedicated” team to this significant point, Kemp highlighted Astra Space’s tireless work and unwavering goal to “make Rocket 4 the least expensive, highest volume rocket available.”
“I think this is going to be the most reliable, most affordable rocket) ever produced in the history of the world,” he concluded.
If he is correct, Astra Space could be poised to rewrite the commercial space launch rocket equation.
Christopher Plain has spent the last six years as Associate News Editor and Head Science Reporter at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his novels at plainfiction.com, or email him at christopher@thedebrief.org.