On the final day of World Space Business Week in Paris, Laura Todd sits down with Charlotta Sund, CEO of SSC, for their second annual conversation – and a reflection on four rewarding days in what both agree is the best industry there is.
Fresh from a panel on ground segment as a service, Sund notes broad agreement among peers about where the sector stands today and where it needs to go. Two themes stand out for her: how deep space and lunar missions will develop, and how ground station networks can support them; and the prospect of customers combining different suppliers and working in genuine partnership rather than isolation.
The week’s headline development is SSC’s newly announced partnership with Firefly, building the capability to place satellites into orbit using Firefly’s Alpha rocket launched from SSC’s Esrange spaceport in northern Sweden, with two launches targeted for 2028. Sund describes the collaboration as evidence of what ambitious cooperation can achieve – leapfrogging on capability and bringing knowledge and competence developed in the United States into Europe, where it is badly needed.
She is refreshingly candid about the reality behind such partnerships. Culture fit, she argues, matters as much as technology: it is not simply a matter of inviting a US space company to northern Sweden. There are authorities to work with, export requirements to navigate, and a considerable volume of administration that, she admits, the company underestimated. What made it work was two organisations committed to a common goal – and the moment those rockets finally fly from Esrange will, she says, be one worth celebrating.
Running through the conversation is a distinctly Swedish instinct: as a small country, exporting expertise, products and services has long been essential. Sund emphasises the importance of European, Scandinavian and Nordic collaboration, while arguing equally that Europe must be present in the world’s most advanced space market, where SSC maintains strong ground station services.
Looking to the year ahead, she previews a topic she would like to discuss more: SSC’s consultancy arm and its expanding expertise across European countries – and how packaging that knowledge alongside the ground station network and launch capability can help customers put it all together.
