Vulcan rocket gearing up for a major launch next week

United Launch Alliance (ULA) is a partnership between Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) and Lockheed Martin (NYSE: ) is preparing for the first launch of its Vulcan rocket. The launch, scheduled for next week from Cape Canaveral, is critical not only to ULA’s competitive position relative to SpaceX, but also to a potential sale of the joint venture.

Successful Vulcan deployment is expected to clear a massive backlog worth hundreds of millions of dollars. These include carrying a lunar lander designed to achieve the first soft landing on the moon in the United States in 50 years, using engines from Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin for the first time. The press conference is scheduled for 2:18 a.m. ET on Monday.

The mission also represents ULA’s move away from reliance on its Atlas V rocket, which has come under scrutiny for its engines imported from Russia. The retirement of Atlas V and Delta will leave Vulcan as the only ULA rocket capable of competing with SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Blue Origin’s upcoming New Glenn, both of which share the same engine technology.

The Vulcan rocket costs about $110 million per launch and is designed to take back market share from the Falcon 9 rocket, which is priced at about $62 million. ULA’s Vulcan and retired Atlas V have been selected by the U.S. Space Force to carry out 60% of the Pentagon’s missions around 2027. Vulcan’s launch will also be one of two certification flights required by the Space Force before it can carry Pentagon satellites.

Amid these developments, Boeing and Lockheed Martin are discussing the sale of their joint venture, and the launch of Vulcan could affect the outcome. Acquisition talks have been going on for more than a year, with several companies including Blue Origin showing interest. ULA’s valuation, complicated by its differences from the Atlas and Delta rockets, is speculated to be between $2 billion and $3 billion.

This strategic move comes at a time when the U.S. aerospace industry has grown significantly since ULA was founded in 2006. Boeing and Lockheed Martin both have their own aerospace businesses. Lockheed is involved in the construction of the lunar rover and has invested in ABL Space, while Boeing faces the challenge of the Starliner astronaut capsule, which has cost about $1.5 billion since 2014.

Reuters contributed to this article.

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