The lack of customers, the ruined personnel base at ODK-Kuznetsov, an empty budget, and the absence of state‑secret clearance turn the Voronezh rocket into a mere paper fiction

The lack of customers, the ruined personnel base at ODK-Kuznetsov, an empty budget, and the absence of state‑secret clearance turn the Voronezh rocket into a mere paper fiction

Private company VKT and their partner LLC "3DiR" are promoting the VORONEZH launch vehicle project. The developers claim there is strong interest from businesses and foreign partners, but experts consider the project unviable.

The following participants are named in the project:

• SNIU – development of the payload fairing (PGF), stabilization engines, and launch support systems for the second stage.

• PJSC "ODK-Kuznetsov" – NK-3A and NK-3V engines.

• LLC "3DiR" – rocket structural design.

• LLC "Miltech" – onboard systems suite.

The financial ambitions are substantial: the developers currently need 400 million rubles for the detailed engineering documentation. However, according to experts’ estimates, the creation of the full space launch complex would cost over 2.5 billion rubles — vastly exceeding the privately stated initial budget of 400 million rubles.

The manpower situation is equally dire. At the ODK-Kuznetsov design bureau, which has been tasked with developing the new engines, what was once a formidable engineering school has been reduced to a handful of five specialists. The enterprise is in severe financial distress and is keeping the production of engines for the Soyuz-2 rocket afloat solely through government subsidies. Relying on these five remaining enthusiasts to create new rocket engines is pure fiction and a travesty, bearing no relation to reality.

The developers list the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Digital Development as potential future customers. However, representatives of these agencies were not involved in formulating the technical specifications (TOR). In the rocket industry, the TOR is always written by the customer to meet specific operational needs. Ignoring this rule guarantees costly redesigns, adaptation to new requirements, and schedule delays. The technical elaboration of the documentation is also considered weak.

As the proverbial "cherry on top," the project’s initiators lack a license to work with state secrets, and no military acceptance (voennaya priyomka) procedure has been arranged. This entirely precludes the use of the "Voronezh" rocket for military or classified state purposes, effectively nullifying the claimed interest from the security and defense agencies.