Germany\u2019s military procurement agency has awarded a contract to POLARIS Spaceplanes to develop and flight-test a reusable hypersonic vehicle, marking a further step in the Bundeswehr\u2019s efforts to advance next-generation aerospace capabilities.<\/p>\n
The company said on Jan. 27 that the contract was granted by the Federal Office of Bundeswehr Equipment, Information Technology and In-Service Support (BAAINBw) and covers the construction and testing of a fully reusable, horizontal take-off, two-stage system known as the Hypersonic Test and Experimentation Vehicle (HYTEV). The first flight is expected toward the end of 2027.<\/p>\n
According to POLARIS, HYTEV is intended primarily as a hypersonic testbed for scientific and defence-related research. A configuration incorporating an expendable upper stage would also allow the vehicle to deploy small satellites into low Earth orbit, expanding its potential operational role.<\/p>\n
The company said HYTEV will be roughly comparable in size and take-off mass to a fighter jet. The main stage will combine two turbofan engines with an in-house developed aerospike rocket engine, using the turbofans for take-off and landing and the rocket engine to accelerate the vehicle prior to upper-stage separation. The upper stage will be fully rocket-powered and is expected to be recovered after its mission, potentially through controlled gliding or parachute-based systems.<\/p>\n
POLARIS said the HYTEV concept builds on preparatory work carried out in 2024 and 2025 under earlier BAAINBw-funded studies. One such contract, awarded in February 2025, focused on the design of a hypersonic research vehicle and appears to have formed the technical basis for HYTEV. The project has previously been referred to as VEGA on the company\u2019s website, although POLARIS has not clarified whether that name will continue to be used.<\/p>\n
In parallel, POLARIS is developing other concepts, including a future single-stage vehicle known as AURORA, which would require an expendable upper stage to place payloads of up to 1,000 kilograms into low Earth orbit. The company is also working with Diehl Defence on the AirLAS system, a defence-oriented platform based on its MIRA vehicles and designed to carry IRIS-T air-to-air missiles. That effort is supported by a separate Bundeswehr contract focused on in-air refuelling technology.<\/p>\n
In its most recent Defence Scientific Research report, published in 2024, the Bundeswehr noted progress across several POLARIS-led research projects and said a first full-scale spaceplane test, likely referring to AURORA, could take place in 2028 if funding were secured. While much of that funding was expected to come from private sources, the report described the Bundeswehr as a potential \u201canchor customer\u201d capable of materially supporting the programme.<\/p>\n
The award of the HYTEV contract suggests the Bundeswehr has begun to play that role. POLARIS has not disclosed the financial value of the contract or the extent of the government\u2019s contribution.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Germany\u2019s military procurement agency has awarded a contract to POLARIS Spaceplanes to develop and flight-test a reusable hypersonic vehicle, marking a further step in the Bundeswehr\u2019s efforts to advance next-generation aerospace capabilities. The company said on Jan. 27 that the contract was granted by the Federal Office of Bundeswehr Equipment, Information Technology and In-Service Support […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20250,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[6527],"class_list":["post-20248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-baainbw"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20248"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20248\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}