Space industry : Europe regains its independence

Faced with signi­fi­cant­ly increa­sed inter­na­tio­nal com­pe­ti­tion over the last decade and recent U‑turns by the Trump admi­nis­tra­tion, Europe is see­king to (re)gain its auto­no­my and com­pe­ti­ti­ve­ness in the space indus­try, des­pite temp­ta­tions at natio­nal level for coun­tries to conti­nue deve­lo­ping their own capa­bi­li­ties. Lio­nel Suchet, inter­im CEO of the French Natio­nal Centre for Space Stu­dies (CNES), ana­lyses the chal­lenges of the cur­rent situa­tion for France and the continent.

Lio­nel Suchet. In coun­tries that pio­nee­red space explo­ra­tion, such as the Uni­ted States, Rus­sia and France, space agen­cies deve­lo­ped around two high­ly stra­te­gic and, as such, state-run pillars of acti­vi­ty : research and defence. These appli­ca­tions remain high­ly rele­vant today. Research needs space resources more than ever. Take the model­ling of cli­mate change, for example, where satel­lite obser­va­tion plays a cen­tral role. In the mili­ta­ry are­na, space has not only become an essen­tial sup­port for the armed forces but is also emer­ging as a new theatre of conflict.

Over the past decade or so, a third pillar has deve­lo­ped along­side the first two, respon­ding not to ins­ti­tu­tio­nal logic but to that of the open eco­no­my. The pro­li­fe­ra­tion of Earth obser­va­tion mis­sions for scien­ti­fic pur­poses and the digi­tal revo­lu­tion, which has made it pos­sible to pro­cess satel­lite data on a mas­sive scale, have paved the way for a wide range of appli­ca­tions, attrac­ting new pri­vate inves­tors willing to take grea­ter risks.

This is a very exci­ting time for the entire sec­tor. But it is also mar­ked by increa­sin­gly fierce inter­na­tio­nal com­pe­ti­tion and some ten­sions among Euro­pean coun­tries to deve­lop their own space capa­bi­li­ties. Europe’s prio­ri­ty is the­re­fore to streng­then its cohe­sion and sove­rei­gn­ty in the mili­ta­ry are­na, main­tain its level of excel­lence in research, and build real com­pe­ti­ti­ve­ness at the conti­nen­tal level in the com­mer­cial arena.

It’s impor­tant to keep in mind that France is by far the lea­ding space nation in Europe. Our space indus­try is extre­me­ly well-deve­lo­ped and high­ly skilled. France – and through it, Europe – has a strong indus­trial base thanks the invest­ments made by suc­ces­sive govern­ments since 1961. Along­side esta­bli­shed indus­trial players, the French start-up eco­sys­tem is pro­ving to be very dyna­mic. CNES has sup­por­ted its deve­lop­ment, par­ti­cu­lar­ly through France 2030. €1.3bn has been allo­ca­ted, and is now almost ful­ly com­mit­ted, to sup­port inno­va­tive initiatives.

But it would be point­less to pit the two models against each other, as they bene­fit from each other. The start-up eco­sys­tem is now ente­ring a phase of sta­bi­li­sa­tion, which will inevi­ta­bly lead to some conso­li­da­tion. As for the large groups, although they are cur­rent­ly expe­rien­cing dif­fi­cul­ties due to the col­lapse of the mar­ket for pri­vate geo­sta­tio­na­ry satel­lites resul­ting from com­pe­ti­tion from Star­link in the Uni­ted States, they unders­tand they will have to make signi­fi­cant efforts to remain com­pe­ti­tive. They have alrea­dy taken steps in this direc­tion : major restruc­tu­ring plans have been announ­ced, ins­pi­red in part by the prac­tices of smal­ler com­pa­nies that are begin­ning to grow, and joint pro­jects with start-ups are deve­lo­ping. And as you point out, they are loo­king into oppor­tu­ni­ties to conso­li­date their acti­vi­ties, but no deci­sion has yet been made on either the prin­ciple or the approach.

France has taken a signi­fi­cant lead in this field in Europe. We have been wor­king for years to streng­then our capa­bi­li­ties, which we make avai­lable to other Euro­pean coun­tries. We have state-of-the-art obser­va­tion satel­lites, inclu­ding CSO‑3, laun­ched in March by Ariane 6, two next-gene­ra­tion encryp­ted tele­com­mu­ni­ca­tions satel­lites thanks to the Syra­cuse IV pro­gramme, and space-based elec­tro­ma­gne­tic lis­te­ning capa­bi­li­ties, tech­no­lo­gies that France is the only Euro­pean coun­try to have mastered.

The top prio­ri­ty at the Euro­pean level seems to me to be poli­ti­cal : we must convince all Mem­ber States of the urgent need for genuine Euro­pean auto­no­my when it comes to defence, some­thing France has always advo­ca­ted. On the tech­ni­cal front, one vital issue was to regain auto­no­mous access to space. The suc­cess­ful launches of Ariane 6 in July 2024 and March 2025, and the return to flight of Vega‑C at the end of 2024, are the­re­fore excellent news.

A major deve­lop­ment is final­ly under­way in the field of direct action in space : it is regret­table, but this threat is very real. Today, we know that forei­gn powers are capable of sen­ding small manoeu­vrable satel­lites to spy on, jam signals or threa­ten satel­lites belon­ging to other coun­tries. We must the­re­fore equip our­selves with the means to cha­rac­te­rise these threats and even respond to poten­tial attacks. We are alrea­dy wor­king on this with the YODA demons­tra­tor pro­gramme, two patrol satel­lites that will moni­tor the envi­ron­ment of our space sys­tems in geo­sta­tio­na­ry orbit and pave the way for the launch of ope­ra­tio­nal capa­bi­li­ties by 2030.

Space has long been seen, quite right­ly, as a model for Euro­pean inte­gra­tion, and the Euro­pean Space Agen­cy (ESA), foun­ded in 1975, has played a key role in the deve­lop­ment of Europe’s space pro­gramme. Geo­gra­phi­cal return pro­ved very effec­tive at a time when eve­ry­thing had to be built from scratch. But today it is beco­ming coun­ter­pro­duc­tive, as it amounts to dupli­ca­ting Euro­pean forces at a time when the indus­trial fabric on the conti­nent is alrea­dy very dense and com­pe­ti­tion with the Uni­ted States, Chi­na and India is growing.

It is time to aim for grea­ter Euro­pean com­pe­ti­ti­ve­ness and the­re­fore to move to a dif­ferent mode of ope­ra­tion. But which one ? We are cal­ling for the Euro­pean Com­mis­sion itself to finance and manage major space pro­grammes. Since 2009, it has had ad hoc legal autho­ri­ty, and its use of indus­try is based on com­pe­ti­tion rather than geo­gra­phi­cal return. I won’t hide the fact that France is fair­ly iso­la­ted within ESA on this sub­ject, which is unders­tan­dable given its pro­minent posi­tion. But we are convin­ced that this is the way for­ward, and it seems that our views are being heard at Com­mis­sion level : the Euro­pean Union’s space bud­get has been increa­sing stea­di­ly since 2009, and the new Euro­pean Com­mis­sio­ner for Defence and Space, Andrius Kubi­lius, has again men­tio­ned a three­fold increase in this amount for the next finan­cial framework.

This is indeed ano­ther pit­fall that must be avoi­ded, as ESA has deve­lo­ped consi­de­rable exper­tise in the mana­ge­ment of large pro­grammes. But it is enti­re­ly pos­sible that the EU could draw on ESA’s exper­tise to moni­tor and deve­lop major pro­grammes at the ope­ra­tio­nal level, while retai­ning its own rules on gover­nance and pro­cu­re­ment. This would not, of course, prevent ESA from conti­nuing to fund and manage cer­tain spe­ci­fic programmes…

It is time to aim for grea­ter Euro­pean com­pe­ti­ti­ve­ness and the­re­fore to move to a dif­ferent mode of operation

To be honest, I am hope­ful that things will move in this direc­tion. Inter­nal dis­cus­sions within ESA and its dis­cus­sions with Mem­ber States show that it is begin­ning to accept the idea of beco­ming the exe­cu­tive arm of a Euro­pean poli­cy led by the EU. This is nothing to be asha­med of : CNES, the exe­cu­tive arm of French space poli­cy, is proof of this.

The Uni­ted States is a long-stan­ding and valued part­ner of France and Europe, par­ti­cu­lar­ly on issues rela­ting to the envi­ron­ment and explo­ra­tion. The oldest mea­su­re­ment taken from space, sea level, is the result of a his­to­ric col­la­bo­ra­tion bet­ween CNES and NASA’s Jet Pro­pul­sion Labo­ra­to­ry. We are also invol­ved in major man­ned and unman­ned explo­ra­tion pro­grammes – the lat­ter being of great inter­est to our scien­ti­fic com­mu­ni­ty – to the Moon and Mars : Arte­mis, but also the US mis­sion to return samples from Mars, Mars Sample Return, and Exo­Mars, a Euro­pean mis­sion to explore the sur­face of the Red Pla­net with a rover, which was to be laun­ched by a US launch vehicle.

At this stage, we have not recei­ved any offi­cial mes­sage from NASA ques­tio­ning these part­ner­ships. But the cur­rent signals are indeed catas­tro­phic, both in terms of rhe­to­ric and in terms of layoffs at NASA, JPL² and NOAA³. We must the­re­fore remain on high alert : it is not a ques­tion of Europe taking the ini­tia­tive to halt col­la­bo­ra­tions, but of pre­pa­ring contin­gen­cy plans in case the worst happens.

I don’t believe it is in Europe’s inter­est to aim for com­plete auto­no­my in these areas. While total sove­rei­gn­ty is neces­sa­ry in the field of defence, it is not neces­sa­ry in the fields of research and exploration.

Our values on this point are com­ple­te­ly dif­ferent from those of the Uni­ted States, for whom explo­ra­tion is syno­ny­mous with natio­nal conquest. Europe, for its part, has always pro­mo­ted man­ned spa­ce­flight and explo­ra­tion of the solar sys­tem as a tool for inter­na­tio­nal coope­ra­tion. If the US poli­cy change is confir­med, other coun­tries could be affec­ted, with which we could consi­der coope­ra­ting : I am thin­king in par­ti­cu­lar of Japan and India, whose space capa­bi­li­ties are deve­lo­ping rapid­ly, par­ti­cu­lar­ly in low Earth orbit.

This situa­tion also makes a case for the Euro­pean Union to take the lead on major pro­grammes rather than ESA, which by its very nature lacks poli­ti­cal visi­bi­li­ty and is natu­ral­ly gui­ded sole­ly by the indus­trial inter­ests of its Mem­ber States.

This is an emi­nent­ly poli­ti­cal ques­tion. We have the tech­ni­cal capa­bi­li­ties to do so, pro­vi­ded we have the neces­sa­ry finan­cial resources : we have alrea­dy laun­ched ini­tia­tives to pro­duce car­go ships that auto­ma­ti­cal­ly resup­ply space sta­tions, and it is enti­re­ly fea­sible to deve­lop these for man­ned flights.

With regard to the pro­lon­ged human pre­sence on the Moon, which is cur­rent­ly being consi­de­red, it is impor­tant to bear in mind that esta­bli­shing a lunar base raises the ques­tion of land owner­ship, which is not a neu­tral issue from either a legal or poli­ti­cal point of view. In the future, the rules for using resources in situ and the legis­la­tion to be applied on ano­ther celes­tial body, which are new issues for huma­ni­ty, are like­ly to be dis­cus­sed only among those who will be living there.

We were very sho­cked by the dis­mis­sal of trus­ted contacts within NASA. We are obvious­ly rea­dy to wel­come them if they wish to come.

Interview by Anne Orliac