Space Stocks: How Much of a Space Stock Is Actually Space?

Lockheed Martin's Space segment sold $13.0 billion in its 2025 fiscal year. That was 17.4% of the company.

This guide shows where space revenue sits. It covers how much of each large defence contractor is space, which part of the space economy carries the money, then what the smaller listed companies earn. Every company figure comes from a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Four large contractors have a segment with space in its name. A segment is a part of a business that a company reports separately, with its own revenue. Only two of those segments are named for space alone.

Chart 1 shows each company's space-named segment as a share of its total revenue in the 2025 fiscal year. The two shaded bars are ceilings, because those segments mix space with a great deal that is not space.

Lockheed Martin reports a segment called Space. In the year to 31 December 2025 it sold $13.0 billion against company sales of $75.0 billion, which is 17.4%. Almost all of it went to one customer: $12.8 billion of the $13.0 billion was sales to the US Government.

Northrop Grumman reports Space Systems. Its external sales were $10.3 billion of company sales of $42.0 billion, which is 24.5%. The segment figure the filing prints first, $10.8 billion, includes sales to Northrop's other segments. External sales leave out what a segment sells to the rest of its own company, a distinction covered in What Is Revenue?.

Boeing and L3Harris publish no space-only figure. Boeing's segment is Defense, Space & Security, $27.2 billion of $89.5 billion, or 30.4%. L3Harris reports Space & Airborne Systems. Its external sales were $6.9 billion of $21.9 billion, or 31.5%.

Both of those segments contain fighters, tankers, weapons and air traffic networks. Their shares are ceilings, not measurements. Because Boeing's space-named segment is larger than Lockheed's Space segment while disclosing no space revenue, no ranking of the largest space business is possible from these filings.

Even the two segments named for space alone hold more than satellites. Lockheed's Space segment includes the Trident II D5 submarine-launched ballistic missile and the Next Generation Interceptor, a missile defence programme. The filing gives no split between satellites and missiles inside it.

Those shares describe the contractors. The industry they sell into is larger than any of them.

Chart 2 shows three parts of the global space economy for 2025, from the Space Foundation's annual report on the sector.

Positioning, navigation and timing services plus ground equipment came to $419.8 billion. Ground equipment here is largely consumer devices: the report attributes about 85% of satellite navigation device sales to consumer electronics. Satellite navigation in a phone is counted in the space economy.

Spacecraft entering service were worth $65.4 billion. Orbital launches were worth $19.2 billion, which is 2.8% of the $686 billion total.

Those three parts come to $504.4 billion. The report's total of $686 billion carries further categories that the chart does not show.

By value, launch is the smallest of the three.

A pure play is a smaller listed company that earns most of its revenue from space. The pure plays are far smaller than the contractors. Lockheed's Space segment was about 22 times Rocket Lab's whole revenue.

Source: company Form 10-K filings; YX Insights

The table gives four pure plays for their latest full fiscal year. The year-end dates differ, so the fiscal year is named for each. An operating result is what revenue is left after the costs of running the business.

Rocket Lab is a listed launch company. In its 2025 fiscal year it had revenue of $601.8 million, of which Launch Services was $199.0 million. Launch was 33.1% of the company for that full year. In the three months to 30 June 2026 launch was $44.6 million of $234.1 million, which is 19.0%.

Its larger business builds spacecraft, not rockets. Space Systems, the name Rocket Lab gives that segment, was $402.8 million of 2025 revenue.

Rocket Lab lost $228.8 million at the operating line in 2025. Planet Labs lost $95.1 million over its own fiscal year, Intuitive Machines $87.2 million.

Iridium is the exception. It operates a satellite network. Most of its revenue is service revenue. In 2025 it earned $236.0 million of operating income on revenue of $871.7 million.

Backlog is the value of work a company has signed and not yet delivered.

Chart 3 sets backlog against the most recent full-year revenue for three companies, in millions of dollars. Each company's backlog date differs, so each is named below.

Rocket Lab ended 2025 with backlog of $1,847.3 million against revenue of $601.8 million for the year, about three times as much. Its filing notes that launch and spacecraft contracts typically give customers termination rights.

Intuitive Machines shows the distinction most sharply. At 30 June 2026 its backlog was $1,762.0 million while its remaining performance obligations were $814.7 million. Remaining performance obligations are the value of signed fixed-price work a company must still deliver, counted under accounting rules. The filing itself reconciles the $947.3 million difference.

Planet Labs reports both. At 31 January 2026 its remaining performance obligations were $852.4 million against a company-defined backlog of $900.4 million, the difference being the part a customer may cancel. About 34% of its obligations were expected to become revenue within twelve months.

Backlog describes work spread over several years. It is not a forecast of next year's revenue. In each of the three filings above, some of the contracts behind it can be cancelled.

So a space stock can be mostly something else. Space was 17.4% of Lockheed Martin's sales and 24.5% of Northrop Grumman's. Three of the four pure plays lost money at the operating line. The backlog behind them is not revenue yet.

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Of the two contractors that report a segment named for space alone, Lockheed Martin's is the larger. Its Space segment sold $13.0 billion in the year to 31 December 2025, which was 17.4% of total sales of $75.0 billion. Northrop Grumman's Space Systems had external sales of $10.3 billion. Boeing's space-named segment is larger than either, at $27.2 billion, but it mixes space with aircraft and weapons and no space-only figure is published.

Only partly. Launch Services was $199.0 million of its $601.8 million of revenue in the 2025 fiscal year, which is 33.1%. In the three months to 30 June 2026 the share was 19.0%. Its larger segment builds spacecraft.

Three of the four smaller listed space companies in this guide made an operating loss in their latest full fiscal year. Rocket Lab lost $228.8 million in 2025, Planet Labs $95.1 million and Intuitive Machines $87.2 million. Iridium, which operates a satellite network, earned $236.0 million of operating income on revenue of $871.7 million in 2025.

The Space Foundation put the global space economy at $686 billion for 2025. Most of that is positioning, navigation and timing services plus ground equipment, mainly consumer devices that use satellite navigation. Together those came to $419.8 billion. Orbital launches were worth $19.2 billion, which is 2.8% of the total.

DISCLAIMER: This article is strictly educational. Any information or analysis in this note is not an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities. Nothing in this note is intended to be investment advice and nor should it be relied upon to make investment decisions. Any opinions, analyses, or probabilities expressed in this note are those of the author as of the note's date of publication and are subject to change without notice.