ESA BIC satsearch: the global space supply chain marketplace

It is the first marketplace for space and provides an open, global, up-to-date database of space products and services through the company developed search engine.

The mission is to digitalize the global space supply chain, leading to better designs, shorter lead times, and ultimately more cost-effective and robust space systems.

Space engineers face a myriad of questions about the global market during the design process.

The global space supply chain is becoming increasingly fragmented, hence they face a slew of time-consuming challenges, including product search, data export and harmonization, design trade-offs and risk assessment.

Finding the right products currently costs thousands of man-hours because there is no easy way to search for them, fragmented supplier landscape and difficult access to supply chain information.

”We have developed a unique approach to collect, curate and structure unstructured supply chain data,” says satsearch Co-founder and CEO Kartik Kumar.

“We are actively developing a tool-chain for creation, maintenance, and use of electronic data sheets, which allows us to natively embed supply chain data across the space mission life cycle.”

“Complex space missions necessitate the use of intelligent design tools. Our tool-chain makes Data-Driven Design (D3) a reality, enabling rapid feasibility assessment, concept validation and robust design,” adds Kartik.

“Integrated Mission Design is our proprietary D3 approach that embeds supply chain data in the engineering and procurement process through deep software integration.”

In May 2018, satsearch was accepted into the ESA BIC Noordwijk incubation program, offered through SBIC Noordwijk, in the Netherlands.

This marks an important milestone for the company as the ESA BIC offers the ideal platform to propel the company forward towards full-scale supply chain digitalization.

Already on five continents

The satsearch system covers already over 650 suppliers globally, with products from companies in 31 countries.

In February, ANTRIX Corporation Limited, a wholly-owned Government of India Company, joined by signing a Memorandum of Understanding with satsearch to showcase specific products and services offered by the Indian space sector. 

ANTRIX aims to tap into global reach offered through the satsearch platform and to highlight the core technologies mastered by the Indian space supply chain.

At the Toulouse Space Show 2018 the French Space Agency Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) signed the Memorandum of Understanding with satsearch to digitalize space engineering.

This marked another key stepping-stone towards the goal of building a rich ecosystem of partners to support satsearch efforts to spearhead digitalization of the global space supply chain.

10th ESA Investment Forum

ESA Business Incubation Centre Noordwijk start-up satsearch will participate to the 10th ESA Investment Forum 31 January 2019.

The ESA Investment Forum is an ESA space solutions event organized by ESA Business Incubation Centre (ESA BIC) Hessen and Baden-Württemberg in partnership with with High-Tech Gründerfonds Management GmbH and Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V. (DLR) 

The aim is to foster investments in start-ups operating in the space domain as well as within related application domains, downstream as well as upstream. It provides a platform for networking as well as matchmaking between innovative space start-ups and investors.

ESA BICs - World's largest ecosystem for space-related entrepreneurship

The ESA Business Incubation Centre (ESA BIC) Hessen and Baden-Württemberg is part of the ESA space solutions network of 20 ESA BICs throughout Europe.

The centres are operated under ESA’s Technology Transfer and Business Incubation Programme Office (TTPO) with the European network of Technology Transfer Brokers. Together they offer access to all aspects of space-related innovation, technology and intellectual properties and is a gateway to ESA and European space research and developments.

The 20 ESA BICs in 17 European countries – Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the Netherlands and UK – are forming the largest ecosystem in the world for space-related entrepreneurship. The 21^th centre is soon to open in Northern Germany and more centres are already under preparation.

Over 700 start-ups have been fostered and another near 180 new start-ups are taken in yearly at the ESA BICs to be supported under the two-years business development boosting programme.