Government

The Korean Government is set to establish a fund to support private space startups, according to local sources. According to the South Korean Ministry of Science and ICT, the Government will create a 50-billion-won fund ($38.5 million) by 2027 to invest in the private space sector. The Korea Venture Investment Corp will operate this fund.

The Council of the EU has given its final approval for the EU’s secure connectivity program for 2023-2027 by adopting a regulation on it. The program sets goals for the EU to deploy an EU satellite constellation called 'IRIS²' (Infrastructure for Resilience, Interconnectivity and Security by Satellite).

The UK Space Agency (UKSA) Accelerator has launched the Leo and Geo programs and has started receiving applications from entrepreneurs keen to scale up their business at pace within the UK’s space industry. The Leo and Geo programs are part of the UKSA Accelerator’s suite of bespoke programs with the aim of supporting entrepreneurs at various levels of their space journey.

The UK Space Agency (UKSA) has announced £1.6 million in funding for eight projects through its Enabling Space Exploration fund on Mars Day. The Agency's goal is to invest in projects that could revolutionize the human ability to journey deeper into space safely and efficiently, using remote technologies and supplies found in space to sustain astronauts and spacecraft. 

Airbus Defense and Space has announced an agreement for Angeo-1, the first very high-performance Angolan Earth observation satellite, which it will develop in France. Furthermore, the agreement will strengthen the collaboration between the two countries. As part of the partnership, Airbus will offer a comprehensive training program for Angolan engineers to build domestic competencies through targeted knowledge transfer.

The Arianespace and ESA-set up independent inquiry commission has disclosed its conclusions on the reasons for the loss of the Vega-C VV22 mission after its launch in French Guiana on Tuesday, 20 December 2022. According to the Commission, after the nominal functioning of the Vega-C first stage P120C and nominal ignition of the second stage (Zefiro 40), a progressive decrease in the chamber pressure 151 seconds after lift-off led to the loss of the mission.

Shey SabripourCesiumAstro has announced that it won a contract through the Department of Defense’s (DoD’s) Space Development Agency (SDA) to advance the company’s multi-beam L-band active electronically scanned array (AESA) antenna. Building upon prior efforts, CesiumAstro will continue developing the Link 16–compatible AESA ahead of the agency’s migration to the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) global satellite network, the LEO-based satellite constellation built to enable key DoD space capabilities.

The Small Satellites & Services International Forum (SSSIF) congress concluded yesterday in Malaga, Spain, after three days in which experts from the space sector gathered to discuss and reflect on the innovation of the international space sector, the present challenges and the future needs of small satellites. 

The UK Space Agency has announced over £50 million for UK companies to develop communication and navigation services for missions to the Moon. The new funding is part of the European Space Agency’s Moonlight program, which aims to launch a constellation of satellites into orbit around the Moon from 2028. As a result, future astronauts, rovers, science experiments and other equipment will be able to communicate, share large amounts of data, including high-definition video, and navigate safely across the lunar surface.

The European Space Agency (ESA) and Deutsche Telekom have partnered to enable seamless connectivity from terrestrial networks, from the sky or from above. At Mobile World Congress 2023 in Barcelona, they signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to work together on the hybrid networks of the future.