ESA title

Our Mission

The development of technology – making new things to do new things – is central to ESA's existence. The Agency spends around 8% of its budget on direct research and development, an activity mandated in the ESA Convention. It runs many preparatory programmes to do this, covering various different inventions, each leading activities based on their technical maturity or their field.

  • TDE The Technology Development Element is responsible for early development stages across all service and technology domains, taking cutting-edge ideas and testing their suitability for space applications.
  • GSTP The General Support Technology Programme is an optional programme that takes previously proven innovations through to succeeding stages of engineering, finally evolving fully-tested hardware ready for adoption by future missions.

Our Responsibility

To make sure that the right technology will be available at the right maturity at the right time for future missions

Shaping the Future

Latest

Loft's Longbow satellite
Enabling & Support

GSTP co-funds development for new Loft Orbital satellite pl…

09/09/2025 1451 views 5 likes
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NASA's Psyche mission
Enabling & Support

Europe's first deep-space optical communication link

10/07/2025 15373 views 92 likes
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Enabling & Support

50 Years of ESA R&D: An Oral History

16/06/2025 609 views 0 likes
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Enabling & Support

50 years of innovation: Zero Debris

16/06/2025 216 views 0 likes
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Enabling & Support

50 Years of Innovative Propulsion in TDE

16/06/2025 730 views 0 likes
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Enabling & Support

1975 to Today: TDE Antenna Developments

16/06/2025 810 views 1 likes
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Enabling & Support

ESA’s first stand-alone Deep Space CubeSat signs new phase

06/03/2025 1946 views 10 likes
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Enabling & Support

Read the Annual Report 2023/24 now

12/12/2024 1058 views 1 likes
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Cyber-resilience
Enabling & Support

Strengthening Space Cybersecurity through ESA’s GSTP

06/05/2026 471 views 1 likes
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AI and Earth observation
Enabling & Support

Information Session on AI Compendium Activities – 23 April …

07/04/2026 446 views 6 likes
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Enabling & Support

A leap forward for Lumio: Phase C officially launched

27/03/2026 573 views 4 likes
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RFI for the Midsize LEO satellite INDustrialisation (M-IND) initiative
Enabling & Support

Now Open: Request for Information (RFI) for the Mid-size LE…

17/03/2026 1739 views 2 likes
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More items

  • Enabling & Support

    Proba-3’s new view on space weather

    03/07/2024 3626 views 32 likes
    Open item
  • Enabling & Support

    GSTP Celebrates 30 Years of Achievements

    29/09/2023 1046 views 4 likes
    Open item
  • Enabling & Support

    Show Me Your Wings: Successful In-flight Demonstration of the ADEO Braking Sail

    27/01/2023 5091 views 16 likes
    Open item
    ADEO Artist Impression