EU satellite constellation: Surprise at Iris2: Start-up builds most of the satellites - Setback for Airbus
With Aerospacelab, a young company from Belgium is asserting itself against the Airbus Group. But a German company is also being used in the European satellite network.
The EU Commission's Iris2 project, aimed at providing a secure internet from space, independent of Elon Musk's Starlink, is moving forward after several delays. The project, budgeted at 15.6 billion Euros, will involve 348 satellites, with Belgian start-up Aerospacelab building up to 264 of them in a deal worth at least 1.8 billion Euros. This makes Iris2 the first major European space project to entrust a start-up with a key area. The project's cost has risen by nearly half from the estimate two years ago.
Written by urgent.news from Handelsblatt's report — not a translation of it. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
