Rocket Lab wins $190 million Pentagon deal for hypersonic test flights
Rocket Lab has signed its largest launch contract in company history: a $190 million block buy for 20 hypersonic test flights with its HASTE vehicle, the company announced Wednesday. The four-year agreement under the Pentagon's MACH-TB 2.0 program pushes Rocket Lab's total backlog above $2 billion and marks another step in the company's emergence as a Tier 1 defense contractor.
The contract runs through the Test Resource Management Center's Multi-Service Advanced Capability Hypersonic Test Bed, a program led by Kratos Defense & Security Solutions with Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division. Rocket Lab will launch from its Wallops Island, Virginia facility. The first of the 20 missions is expected within months.
"This is exactly the kind of fast, affordable access to hypersonic flight testing that the Department of War needs right now," founder and CEO Sir Peter Beck said in the company's announcement. "Our advanced technology, responsive launch schedules, and mass production of our HASTE hypersonic rockets are enabling faster progress across a range of hypersonic experiments."
HASTE — Hypersonic Accelerator Suborbital Test Electron — is a modified version of Rocket Lab's workhorse small orbital launcher, adapted for suborbital trajectories that push payloads to Mach 5 and beyond. Rocket Lab says it has completed multiple HASTE launches for the MACH-TB program since 2023 with a 100% mission success rate. The MACH-TB 2.0 program itself carries a total ceiling of $1.45 billion, making Rocket Lab's $190M share a meaningful but non-majority slice of a large DoD investment.
The contract arrives as Rocket Lab's launch business is accelerating sharply. The company sold 28 new launches in Q1 2026 alone, nearly matching its full-year 2025 volume. Combined launch and space systems backlog now exceeds $2 billion. RKLB shares rose roughly 10% on the news Wednesday.
The strategic bet for Rocket Lab is becoming indispensable to the DoD's hypersonic testing infrastructure. Unlike traditional prime contractors that move slowly and build large, expensive vehicles, HASTE offers commercial responsiveness — rapid fabrication, quick turnaround, and a price point Rocket Lab calls unmatched. The company has been cultivating this position since its first HASTE missions in 2023, and the MACH-TB 2.0 block buy suggests the model is scaling.
The defense market has been searching for affordable, high-cadence hypersonic test pathways. Hypersonic weapons development requires extensive flight testing to validate guidance, materials, and aerodynamics — but the cost and complexity of test flights has been a bottleneck for years. A modified commercial rocket launching from an existing pad, with proven avionics and rapid reuse, addresses that directly.
For investors, the contract is notable not just for its size but for what it signals about Rocket Lab's backlog visibility and defense penetration. With 70 launches now in the manifest and Q1 sales running well ahead of last year, the company is building revenue predictability that pure commercial launch customers don't always provide. Execution risk is the obvious counter: 20 flights over four years is a significant commitment, and any failure would be conspicuous given the mission success record Rocket Lab is touting.
The company is also developing its Neutron medium-lift vehicle, which has attracted separate DoD interest for national security missions. But HASTE is doing the work now — and this contract keeps that revenue stream flowing through 2030.