The Walloon satellite manufacturer Aerospacelab inaugurated its first satellite production plant in the United States, near Los Angeles, a few days ago. The company wants to respond to the growing needs of the institutional and military market in the US, the newspaper reports Litter Tuesday.
“In the United States, we will mainly build communications and Earth observation satellites, such as those we produce in Louvain-la-Neuve and soon Charleroi, but adapted to the specific nature of assembly, integration and testing on the American market, particularly in terms of regulations and technological needs,” says CEO Benoît Deper.
The new factory in California has a surface area of 3,250 m2. The factory should be able to produce an average of two satellites per week.
In the fourth quarter, Aerospacelab will begin the assembly, integration and testing of its solution for the satellite system of the American start-up Xona Space Systems. That company is developing a commercial service for positioning, navigation and synchronization via a satellite constellation in low Earth orbit, which will be able to replace the current GPS systems.
The Belgian company gained a foothold in the US a year ago, by opening a branch in Palo Alto. Aerospacelab has already launched eight small satellites into space from the US, via the American company SpaceX.