Author name: Paul Patrick

On January 13, 2023, Spaceport Esrange — mainland Europe’s first satellite launch facility — will be inaugurated in Sweden. This marks a critical milestone for the continent’s space industry.

Spaceport Esrange will provide the European Space Agency (ESA) with an independent getaway to the stars, enhancing its current capabilities in French Guiana.

At first, the spaceport will be used to launch satellites into orbit.

“Satellites are decisive for many functions of the daily lives of today’s modern world, and the need for them will only increase in the years to come with space playing an even more important role,” Stefan Gardefjord, CEO of the Swedish Space Corporation (SSC), said in a press release.

According to the SSC’s data, around 10,000 new satellites are expected to be launched over the next few years. By 2040, their total number could reach 100,000 — a 1,900% increase compared with the operational satellites in orbit today.

Spaceport Esrange will also host testing of the ESA’s Themis program, which is Europe’s initiative for reusable rocketry. Themis’ reusable space launcher will start first-stage tests, seeking to achieve vehicle liftoff and recovery.

Finally, the facility will be used for suborbital test launches of various next-gen rockets.

Thanks to the above, Spaceport Esrange will help establish the continent’s resilience in space. As per Gardefjord, it will enable a “secure, competitive, and sustainable Europe.”

The launch of Spaceport Esrange will also be a huge positive for startups working in this sector. Not only will there be ample business opportunities, there’s also the question of talent. Having a launch facility will require skilled operators, many of whom will move into different companies, spreading their expertise across the whole continent and helping accelerate and grow Europe’s space sector.

At the moment, Spaceport Esrange is trying to attract satellite owners and orbital rocket manufacturers for potential partnerships. The first satellite launch is expected late 2023.

As part of the 2022 European Innovation Council (EIC) Accelerator program, the Commission selected 78 startups and SMEs to receive up to €470 million in funding.

Depending on its needs, each company will get up to €17.5 million in grants and/or equity investments.

The latter will be made through the EIC Fund, which is now “fully operational” after appointing Luxembourg-based Alter Domus as an external fund manager to streamline the equity payment process and avoid past delays.

The selected companies span across 17 EU and EEA nations, with the addition of Israel and the UK.

Among them, 17% of startups and SMEs are located in Germany, 14% in the Netherlands, and 12% in France and Spain, respectively. These countries combined make up 53% of the total selection.

Below you can see a detailed graph of the number of companies selected in each country:

And you can observe on the map below, the selected startups are mostly located in Western and Northern Europe, while Eastern countries in the EU/EEA aren’t represented at all:

Notably, the sector that attracts most funding by the EIC is health — with 51% of the selected companies offering technologies for medical solutions. Other industries include mobility, climate management, energy storage, agriculture, manufacturing, and AI.

Here are three notable examples of the finalists:

• Spanish Inbrain Neuroelectronics is engineering graphene for the development of neural interfaces, seeking to revolutionize the treatment of neurological diseases.
• Estonia-based Efenco is aiming to reduce natural gas needs and carbon emissions in industrial usage by enabling the industry’s transition to hydrogen with HERC, a novel plasma-assisted combustion (PAC) technology.
• Energy Dome in Italy is working on a long-duration battery energy storage system based on a closed thermodynamic loop that uses CO2 as working fluid. Thanks to the properties of carbon dioxide, the system can store energy efficiently and cost effectively.

These 78 companies will join the 314 selected for funding by the European Innovation Council so far. This is bound to grow, as the EIC’s Accelerator fund has secured €1.13 billion for 2023.