Entrepreneurship

Astrobotic has been selected by NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program to deliver 14 payloads to the Moon on its Peregrine lunar lander in July 2021.

The first half of 2019 has already proven to be a worthy time to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first human landing on the Moon. With China’s Chang'e-4 mission to the far side of the Moon in January and its proactive approach to create a permanent Moon Base, Israel’s private lunar mission in February – which has paved the way for commercial lunar missions, India’s very first mission to the south pole, expected to be launched in September, and NASA’s U.S.$2.6 billion Commercial Lunar Payload Service program and the American ambitions to send humans back to the Moon by 2024, the Moon race is on.

Kleos Space S.A., the space-powered Radio Frequency Reconnaissance data provider, advises that the Kleos’ Scouting Mission-1 launch is confirmed for August 2019 on a Rocket Lab Electron launch vehicle.

Kleos Space S.A., the space-powered Radio Frequency Reconnaissance data provider, has been granted the Luxembourg Government Concession to establish and operate a Luxembourg satellite system (Concession).

Innovative Solutions in Space was selected by the University of Hawaii at Manoa's Hawaii Space Flight Laboratory (HSFL) to realize their 6U platform. ISISpace and HSFL will work closely on the design for this challenging mission. ISISpace will provide the platform while the payload integration and flight preparation will be completed by HSFL.

GomSpace's subsidiary in Luxembourg and the European Space Agency (ESA) have signed a contract of 400,000 Euros for the Phase A design of the Miniaturised Asteroid Remote Geophysical Observer (M-ARGO) mission.

Sweden's ÅAC Microtec AB has announced the first Celtic connection in space as Clyde Space, Scotland's largest space company and subsidiary of ÅAC Microtec AB, signed a contract with University College Dublin (UCD). 

The UN Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) and the European Space Agency (ESA) have signed a joint statement on their wish to cooperate on the challenge of space debris.

On the occasion of the meetings between CNES’s Directorate of Innovation, Applications and Science (DIA) and the Government of Kerala, India, on 16, 17 and 18 May 2019, the Centre national d'études spatiales (CNES), through its Connect-by-CNES programme (CbC), and the Kerala Start-Up Mission (KSUM) signed a Letter of Intent (LoI) to foster collaboration between French and Indian innovation ecosystems in the domain of New Space.

In order to help all countries identify how space can sustain their efforts to reach the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) and the European Space Agency (ESA) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to facilitate access to space solutions with an emphasis on developing countries.