Tag: Launch Vehicle Platforms

For the first time, a German company has achieved the “lift-off” of a commercially viable launch vehicle. At the Australian launch site in Koonibba, HyImpulse, a German manufacturer and system provider of commercial launch vehicles for satellite transport, successfully test-launched the 12-metre-long and 2.5-tonne single-stage rocket “SR75“, which can transport small satellites weighing up to…

Sidus Space, a multi-faceted Space and Data-as-a-Service satellite company announced the successful delivery of two electronic LCS cabinets to Bechtel as part of NASA’s mobile launcher 2. These cabinets, integral to the Launch Control System, mark a significant milestone in Sidus Space’s contribution to NASA’s Artemis Campaign aimed at lunar exploration and colonization. Furthermore, Sidus…

Arianespace signed a launch contract with the European Space Agency (ESA) for the deployment of the SMILE (Solar-wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer) mission, a joint ESA-Science and Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) initiative that aims to better understand our solar system.  SMILE is designed to study the Earth’s magnetic environment, specifically its interaction with solar…

The Spanish company PLD Space has attained 120 million euros in funding to date, thus ensuring it can meet its upcoming technological and corporate milestones, culminating in the launch of the MIURA 5 mission at the end of 2025. Since its foundation, the company, which made history in October 2023 with the successful flight of…

Rocket Lab USA, one of the global leaders in launch services and space systems, deployed two satellites to two different orbits approximately 500km apart on its 47th Electron mission. The ‘Beginning Of The Swarm’ mission lifted off from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 in Mahia, New Zealand at 10:32 NZST on April 24th, 2024 with…

The UK spaceflight company Orbex has received £16.7m from six backers in an update to its Series C funding round. With pre-launch testing underway, the funding will help Orbex ramp up the development of Prime, its 19-metre-long, two-stage rocket designed to transport small satellites into Low Earth Orbit. The aim is to ensure full readiness…

Inversion, founded in 2021 to build re-entry vehicles to deliver cargo anywhere on Earth in under one hour, announced that Ray, the company’s technology test platform, will be launching on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 as part of the Transporter-12 Rideshare mission, no earlier than October 2024. The purpose of Ray’s mission for Inversion is to test…