Rocket Lab has signed its largest launch contract to date, bringing in $190 million from the US Department of Defense.
The agreement applies to a total of 20 flights from Rocket Lab’s HASTE (Hypersonic Accelerator Suborbital Test Electron) launch vehicle, a suborbital variant of the company’s Electron rocket. The contract secures HASTE as the primary test vehicle for a joint program between DoD and the Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division.
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HASTE has completed seven launches since its debut in June 2023. The details of many of these missions remain classified, but almost all have been in support of US government entities, such as the DoD, with a handful of previous MACH-TB program launches already flying.
“Our expanded partnership with MACH-TB and the Department of War strengthens America’s national security and delivers reliable, modern hypersonic capabilities with speed and affordability,” RocketLab That’s what CEO Peter Beck says in the press release. (In September 2025, the Trump administration issued an executive order renaming the DoD the Department of War, but
“Ministry of Defense” remains the legal name.)
“This latest contract is another proud moment for the team building the strength and resiliency of America’s space effort,” Beck added.
The contract calls for 20 hypersonic test flights aboard HASTE over a four-year period, with the first round of launches “expected to take place within months of contract signing,” the press release said.
Hypersonic vehicles travel at least five times faster than the speed of sound, and can be difficult to intercept using traditional defense technology. The US military is facing tough competition in the nascent hypersonic weapons arena, which explains the interest in HASTE: the vehicle allows customers to test hypersonic technology and other equipment in the space environment.
The new contract brings Rocket Lab’s launch manifest to more than 70 missions currently in line for launch. Including a recent URGENT mission, which launched on February 25 with the DART AE payload, Rocket Lab has averaged one launch per month so far in 2026, with three Electron launches between January and March, and another expected over the next day or so.
