Commercial Space Around the World
Countries have now started to put some gas on the fire of commercial space and really start to put some effort and thought into their future in the industry. With the U.S. leading the way followed by China and then Russia, it almost seemed like it wasn’t worth it for smaller countries to get into the “space race.”
There has been a shift in recent years with commercial space for these countries in terms of strategies. One strategy has been to niche down, for example, Japan has focused on space debris, and for a long time, Canada has had the Canadarm technology. The main way these companies have launched has been on rideshare missions on big rockets but with the abundance of new small launch startups. Countries are trying to get their own piece of the launch market.
Big Moves in the UK
OneWeb was a company that had an overly ambitious plan to make a satellite constellation of more than 600 satellites. While the project was exciting and they did get billions in funding, it wasn’t enough, and the filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in early 2020, saying it was due to the coronavirus.
After they filed for bankruptcy, they were hoping for a company to buy them and fund the rest of the project. For a while, there were no takers. That was until the U.K. government, along with Bharti Global, partnered up to buy OneWeb in July of 2020. A report says, “Business Secretary Alok Sharma confirmed that the government will invest $500 million and take a significant equity share in OneWeb. This is alongside Bharti Global Ltd, which is part of a group that controls the third largest mobile operator in the world. Bharti will provide the company commercial and operational leadership, and bring OneWeb a revenue base to contribute towards its future success.”
With this purchase, the U.K. is putting itself in a competitive spot in the world space market. Not only are they going to be getting and setting up a massive satellite constellation for improved communication and data control. They are also going to be able to fund more launches to get those satellites up there. It will also allow for more ground control stations to do more business or for more ground control startups to pop up. Overall this will provide a massive boost to the space economy in the U.K.
There are still some legal issues to clear up before the sale goes through, but now is the time to start thinking about what companies will be utilizing OneWeb’s constellations. Now is the time to research what launchers they will fly on and if OneWeb has any customers already lined up for when they go online because those companies will be able to increase their services once the constellation is up.
Another move the U.K made was to initiate a program called “InCubed.” That program made £800,000 [$983,000] available to the U.K. space sector. The program aims to inject money into the Earth Observation industry in hopes to bring out innovation.
The last note with the U.K is that they are close to opening a spaceport in Sutherland, with Orbex being the first to launch out of it. The CEO of Orbex said, “The Highland Council’s approval of the spaceport is a landmark in the history of spaceflight in Europe and will place the community around Tongue, Melness and Skerray, the Highlands Region, Scotland and the United Kingdom at the very heart of the European space launch industry.”
Now is an excellent time to start looking at U.K-based satellite companies and see if you can invest in them or see if any large companies are starting to procure new services from these startups.
Island Action
Looking to make its mark in the space industry, Australia is starting to invest millions of dollars into its commercial space sector. To start, they are investing $11 million [USD $7.6 million] into ten projects ranging from AI, satellite observation, space suits, navigation, and more. They are looking to invest a total of $700 million [USD $483 million] and increase jobs by 20,000 by 2030.
The other island with some action is Japan. A large investment company called SPARX signed a partnership with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to develop and innovate the space industry in Japan. If a large investment company sees something in the space industry, then it might be worth following.
While these counties are working on different projects, they are also working together. Recently Japan and Australia signed the Memorandum of Cooperation (MOC) The purpose of this is stated in the memorandum saying,
“1. Purpose
The purpose of this Memorandum of Cooperation (hereinafter referred to as “this MoC”) is to:
- define areas of potential cooperation;
- designate the Participants’ respective points of contact; and
- define the procedure for implementing cooperation between the Participants, as well as between other Australian entities and JAXA.
2. Areas of potential cooperation
The Participants will exchange information, and discuss and identify potential collaborative opportunities, including in the following areas:
- Space Applications;
- Space Technology;
- Space Environment Utilization;
- Space Science and Space Exploration; and
- Space Education and Outreach.
Other areas of potential cooperation may be added by mutual written consent between the Participants.”
I am excited to see what may come from this partnership and if more countries will start to do the same thing and work together. I like to see that there will be more competition in the world because that will drive innovation. Speaking of competition, another county is starting to enter the private commercial space sector.
India Joins the Party
The last bit of news that I want to bring attention to is that India has announced that they are going to add a private sector to their space department. Within their department of space, India is forming the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre. This center is going to be in charge of regulating the private space sector.
India is not totally new to the space industry. They are new to letting it be commercial. Most of their launches have been on government launch vehicles. Hopefully, India can add some innovation and some competition to the industry. They announced this in June of 2020 so it too early if anything significant will come from it.
Wrap Up
The last few months have shown that countries are now starting to see the benefit of commercial space. The U.K being one of the countries making the biggest push. I am excited to see what this will do to the industry as a whole. With more countries entering, it should give rise to more innovation and more competitive prices. Keep your eyes peeled for what big companies are investing in startups and what services or products they are going to make.