Stories about the tech that’s driving the new space age.
French startup ION-X has raised €3.8M ($4.1M) to fund further R&D and field a demo mission of its scalable small satellite propulsion system. Joining the round: Bpifrance, the French public investment bank. TF Participations, the investment arm of deeptech startup studio TechnoFounders. Geodesic, an investment vehicle that will make way for the future Expansion fund, […]
Image: Domenic Moen/Stratolaunch Stratolaunch has debuted its structurally complete Talon-A test vehicle. Stratolaunch will use the vehicle, dubbed TA-0, to test the release system of Roc and “characterize” Talon’s separation dynamics. Roc is a really massive twin-fuselage carrier craft, boasting six Boeing 747 engines and a payload capacity of 500,000+ lbs. At 385 feet (~117m) […]
OneWeb, Astroscale, the UK Space Agency, and ESA have partnered to launch a space junk servicer by 2024. The partnership comes with a €14.8 million ($15.8 million) investment that will allow Astrocale to advance its ELSA-M debris removal spacecraft from design through manufacturing and up to the satellite’s pre-integration phase. Once launched, ELSA-M will complete […]
Lockheed Martin has partnered with the Filecoin Foundation, a decentralized database developer, to deploy the Interplanetary File System (IPFS) for future use in lunar communications. IPFS: The two companies are working to enable faster internet connection from the Moon. Usually when you try to access a piece of information on the internet, your computer has […]
Burlington, VT-based Benchmark Space Systems has formally expanded across the pond. The propulsion provider has pond-hopped across the Atlantic, not Lake Champlain, just to be clear. Driving the news…Benchmark has opened a new UK facility to serve the British and European markets. The Vermont startup has also signed a deal with Space Forge, a British […]
Beset by software glitches and leaky valves, Boeing’s commercial crew capsule has had a rocky road to orbit. But on Friday, the OFT-2 mission finally delivered Starliner safely to the ISS. ICYMI: The Starliner capsule is meant to provide NASA with a second way to get astronauts to the ISS (along with SpaceX’s Crew Dragon […]
Image: Phase Four El Segundo-based Phase Four today finalized a lease to build a second factory and scale production of its Maxwell engine product line. The new Hawthorne facility will be over 3X larger than Phase Four’s current plant, and capable of cranking out 100 engines a year. Phase Four’s founding vision was to create […]
Midland, TX-based AST SpaceMobile ($ASTS) is looking ahead to the expected summer launch of BlueWalker 3 (BW3) with SpaceX. BW3, a 1.5-ton, 693-square-foot phased array beast, will be a testbed for the company’s space-based cellular broadband network technology. Bet the farm moment? In May, the FCC granted AST SpaceMobile an experimental license to test space-to-ground […]
Orbiter’s inaugural SN1 mission is nearly ready to fly. The satellite transfer vehicle and payload-hosting platform will launch on a Transporter-6 rideshare this October. Hawthorne, CA-based Launcher announced customers this morning: Orbiter will deploy craft for Skyline Celestial, Innova Space, NPC Spacemind, Bronco Space/Cal Poly Pomona, a Stanford student-run organization, and an undisclosed customer… …and host payloads for CesiumAstro, […]
Xona Space Systems has completed testing for its first on-orbit navigation demo mission, Huginn. The spacecraft hardware is now with Spaceflight, Inc. for integration into the SpaceX Transporter-5 rideshare mission later this month. Getting around: The global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) in operation right now are owned and operated by governments. The US has GPS, […]
Italian rocket builder Avio announced late last week that it had successfully tested its M10 methalox upper stage engine at its test facility in Sardinia. The engine will power the third stage of the company’s Vega-E rocket, which it expects to debut in 2026. The M10 at a glance: Vehicle: Vega-E Thrust: 98 kN Specific […]
Franco-German startup The Exploration Company has successfully completed a system requirement review of its Nyx spacecraft. TLDR: The Exploration Company was founded in 2021 with the aim of supplying long-duration in-orbit hosting services to customers, at a fraction of the cost of the ISS. The company is developing a modular spacecraft capable of extended stays […]
