WASHINGTON – The European Space Agency has selected one of the continent's largest space companies and one of its best-funded startups for study contracts that could lead to commercial cargo and crew vehicles.
ESA announced on May 22 that it had awarded contracts worth about €25 million ($27 million) each to Thales Alenia Space and The Exploration Company. The two companies will advance their vehicle concepts designed to transport cargo to and from the International Space Station and commercial space stations.
“Today ESA has once again demonstrated its leadership in space for Europe and European citizens. “The signing of the Low Earth Orbit Cargo Return Service contracts shows how ESA has modernized to meet the demands of the next era of the space economy,” Josef Aschabcher, ESA Director General, said in a statement.
THAT announced plans for freight vehicle program at the European Space Summit in Seville, Spain, last November. The program, inspired by NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) effort from nearly two decades ago, will support commercially developed vehicles that could offer cargo transportation services and could later be converted into crewed spacecraft.
The contracts with Thales Alenia Space and The Exploration Company cover the initial design work for their vehicles. ESA will seek funding for subsequent phases at its next ministerial meeting in late 2025, with the aim of having at least one vehicle ready to enter service by 2028.
Thales Alenia Space, one of Europe's largest space companies, is offering a capsule that it says will be compatible with the ISS and commercial space stations, as well as the Lunar Gateway. Thales facilities in Italy and France will participate in the project together with Altec, a joint venture of Thales Alenia Space Italia and the Italian Space Agency ASI, for the ground segment.
“Leveraging its experience in infrastructure and space exploration vehicles, the company, fully in line with the vision of the European Space Agency, wishes to invest in the development of technological solutions to give Europe sustainable access to low Earth orbit,” he stated. Massimo Comparini, Deputy CEO and Senior Executive Vice President of Thales Alenia Space, said in a statement.
The Exploration Company is a startup working on spacecraft designed to transport cargo to and from Earth orbit and in cislunar space. Its first demonstration mission is planned for the inaugural launch of Ariane 6, now scheduled for the first half of June. The company raised $44 million in a Series A round in early 2023one of the largest seed rounds for a European space startup.
“We want to fly to the space station in the 27th, so we have already started work on the final spacecraft,” said Hélène Huby, CEO of The Exploration Company, in an interview during the 39th.th Space symposium last month. That vehicle, she said, would be ready for a preliminary design review this summer.
While competing for the ESA program, Huby said he was working to win business with American companies working on commercial space stations. The company announced earlier this month that it had opened a U.S. office led by Mark Kirasich, a former NASA official whose duties at the agency included being director of the Orion program.
“If everything goes well,” he said then, “we will have an American customer and a European customer.”
The ESA did not immediately reveal how many companies submitted proposals or why the agency selected two when it previously said it could select up to three. ESA officials previously said They had seen great interest in the program. based on participation in procurement meetings.
Among the companies that had expressed interest in the competition were ArianeGroup, which proposed a reusable vehicle called SUSIE, and Rocket Factory Augsburg, which announced earlier this year a cargo vehicle called Argo that it proposed in cooperation with Space Cargo Unlimited and ATMOS. Space Cargo. .
Leave feedback about this