Abstract The 1990’s have seen tremendous changes in the satellite and space transportation businesses. Dealing with ever more demanding, less and less “space specific” customers and facing an increasingly aggressive competition, the launch services industry has to adapt very quickly to this evolving situation. This explains the implementation of global strategies resting on international alliances and technical improvements aiming at closely adapting the offer to the market trends. This context led world-leading companies and public entities to create, in 1996, the European-Russian joint venture Starsem, devoted to exclusive worldwide marketing and selling of Soyuz launch services. Meeting the specific needs of private customers and public agencies all around the world, the Soyuz launch system is very well adapted to launch missions of the “smaller, better, cheaper” era, including planetary missions. The performance and affordability of the launcher allow Starsem to offer an optimized solution to creating space projects of all kinds. Its reliability becomes a crucial asset when risks have to be minimized in order to cope with ambitious business plans or with scarce public resources. The medium-class Soyuz launch vehicle is one of the most frequently used launch vehicles ever built, providing safe and reliable service for satellite payloads as well as for manned missions. To date, more than 1600 launches have been carried out. The core of the Soyuz family is a basic three-stage launch vehicle. The use of additional upper stages (Ikar, available today or Fregat, available later in 2000) enables the performance of the launcher to be adapted for the mission targeted and to complement perfectly the range of services provided by the Ariane family of launchers. A new version, Soyuz/ST, is under development and should be available from 2001. The launch site in Baikonur (Kazakhstan) features brand new state-of-the-art Starsem Payload Processing Facilities (SPPF) where the satellites are tested, fueled and mounted on the launcher in purpose-built clean rooms, as well as an international class hotel (Sputnik) to accommodate Starsem and customers’ personnel. Leaders in space activities such as Space Systems Loral or the European Space Agency have already chosen Starsem. With six successful launches performed in 1999 for the Globalstar constellation, a promising year 2000 with two successful launches, a solid equity base and a solid commercial backlog, Starsem, symbol of Euro-Russian cooperation in space, has now become an essential player in the international launch services market.