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year after its announcement at the International Astronautical Congress 2018 in Bremen, the joint ESA Business Applications and ESA Space Solutions and Open Cosmos ‘Call to Orbit’ application phase successfully closed with the selection of 10 innovative payloads for LEO applications.
Run by Open Cosmos in collaboration with ESA, the Call to Orbit competition was established to allow a diverse range of organisations to get their technologies and service-oriented applications ready for in-orbit demonstration. Aimed at reducing the amount of time and money needed to get a satellite-based business off the ground, the objective is to dramatically reduce the cost, time and complexity of developing commercially oriented new satellite technologies compliant with Cubesat standards. In total 10 winners have been awarded free access to Open Cosmos’ orbit readiness program, allowing them to go from proof of concept to orbit readiness in just three months using Open Cosmos’ mission analysis software tools and payload qualification platforms.
The selected winners represent a wide range of innovative and promising new technologies, focused on solving some of the world’s biggest challenges. Solutions include new methods of satellite communications, space debris mitigation solutions, atmospheric research and in-orbit spacecraft decontamination. Each winner was selected for its innovative technology, in combination with the practical application of that technology to make future satellites more capable, simpler and more accessible to potential users.
Once the winners have finalised their development and testing with the Open Cosmos software and hardware tools, their solution will be assessed for an in-orbit demonstration opportunity.
Rafel Jorda Siquier, founder and CEO of Open Cosmos said: “With our Call to Orbit program we have found ten very innovative and promising technologies and applications. We are proud to support these ten winners in their next step towards testing their ideas in space. If successful, each of these ten ideas will help us and the rest of the space industry in continuing to make space accessible to anyone.”
Frank Salzgeber, Head of Innovation and Ventures Office at the European Space Agency said: “Helping to lift new ideas off the ground by supporting the creation of new ventures is our day to day job. Achieving this with our alumni from the ESA Business Applications and ESA Space Solutions Programmes is fun!”
The first winners of the competition have been announced, and more will follow over the coming weeks.
Although the announcement of the ten winners marks the end of the application phase of the Call to Orbit competition, Open Cosmos continues to offer its orbit readiness services to anyone with a good idea for a new space technology or application. For university teams that qualify, this service is offered without charge.
Read more about the first winners below:
Lumi Space becomes the first Open Cosmos and ESA Business Applications “Call to Orbit” winner
