The Lijian-1 Y12 carrier rocket carrying 8 satellites takes off from the Dongfeng commercial space innovation pilot zone in Northwest China on April 14, 2026. Photo: Courtesy of the CAS Space

China's private aerospace company CAS Space Co announced on Tuesday that the firms "super factory" of its liquid-propellant rocket Kinetica-2 is now fully completed in Shaoxing, East China's Zhejiang Province, with designed capacity of 12 rockets per year at full production, the company told the Global Times on Tuesday. 

The factory's completion came after the successful maiden flight of the Kinetica-2 rocket on March 30, which sent the New March 01 technology demonstration satellite, the New March 02 satellite (experiment cargo spacecraft) and the TS 01 Educational Satellite into their designated orbits, marking a full success of the launch vehicle's inaugural flight, according to a previous report.

The rocket-making factory integrates final assembly and testing with core component manufacturing, covering production areas for key parts of liquid carrier rockets, including propellant tanks, pipelines and valves, inter-stage sections and ducts, according to the company. 

Li Qinfeng, deputy chief designer of the Kinetica-2 rocket, said in an interview that in terms of production, the facility adopts a pulse-based final assembly and testing line to enable efficient parallel assembly of multiple rockets. In design, standardized modular architecture, common component production and pre-production of core stages allow batch manufacturing, shortening order response cycles and improving rocket launch flexibility. 

Li noted that, within two years of operation, the factory will keeping optimizing production processes to improve quality and efficiency, and is expected to reach full annual capacity of 12 rockets in three to five years.

In 2025, China's private space sector maintained rapid growth, completing 50 launches, accounting for 54 percent of the country's total space launches, the Xinhua News Agency reported. Against this backdrop, a number of private aerospace companies have begun building independent mass-production bases.

Beijing-based private aerospace firm LandSpace has established an intelligent manufacturing hub for aerospace engines based in Huzhou, Zhejiang Province, mainly responsible for the production, manufacturing and testing of liquid rocket engines and core components. It has also set up a liquid rocket testing and production base in Jiaxing, Zhejiang.

In January 2026, the phase-I of the Galactic Energy's manufacturing base project in Nanjing, East China's Jiangsu Province, was structurally completed. The first phase involves a total investment of about 2 billion yuan ($293,119.80) and covers an area of around 118 mu (7.87 hectares). It is expected to be put into operation in June, with an annual capacity of 10 rockets of the same type, according to the Nanjing Daily.

In 2026, China's total number of space launches is expected to exceed 100, including more than 60 commercial launches, accounting for over 60 percent of the total. Private rockets are expected to undertake more than 30 launches, according to the Securities Times.

Global Times