• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to secondary sidebar
  • NEWS:
  • SatNews
  • SatMagazine
  • MilSatMagazine
  • SmallSat News
  • |     EVENTS:
  • SmallSat Symposium
  • Satellite Innovation
  • MilSat Symposium

SatNews

  • HOME
  • Magazines
  • Events
  • Perspectives
  • Industry Calendar
    • IN PERSON
    • VIRTUAL
  • Subscribe

Loft Orbital Signs Airbus To Build 15 Arrow Satellite Platforms

January 17, 2022

Airbus has been contracted to supply space start-up Loft Orbital with more than 15 satellite platforms derived from the Airbus Arrow platform, the foundational satellite platform of the OneWeb constellation.

There are 394 Airbus Arrow platforms on-orbit for the OneWeb constellation and a further 254 are being produced to complete the 648 spacecraft required by OneWeb. With this acquisition, Loft Orbital confirms its intention to make the Airbus Arrow platform a true workhorse enabling its service business model.

Loft Orbital offers a true end-to-end service enabling customers to rapidly deploy and operate their payloads on reliable high-performance satellites at an unprecedented simplicity and affordability. Loft Orbital has also contracted Airbus to modify the Arrow platform to make it suitable for a wider range of longer lifetime missions and applications.

Loft Orbital has offices both in the USA and France, being based in the heart of Silicon Valley in San Francisco, and in the European space capital Toulouse, and intends to continue rapidly growing its French presence following this contract relationship with Airbus.

Airbus previously benefited from public support to develop the Arrow platform and OneWeb pilot line in Toulouse.

The improvements to the Arrow platform, including all the engineering, qualification, test, and production of the first few spacecraft will be performed by Airbus in Toulouse. The production at scale of the remaining Arrow-derived platforms will be performed by Airbus OneWeb Satellites (AOS).

Bruno Le Maire, French minister for the Economy, Finances and the Recovery, said, “This groundbreaking contract between start up Loft Orbital and global space leader Airbus is a very good news. It demonstrates the uptake of New Space companies in France and the synergy across the space ecosystem for developing industry wide innovation. It also testifies the speed at which the French space ecosystem is growing, with start-ups, SMEs, and large groups working together to provide world-class solutions, and fully validates the ongoing government strategy and initiatives to develop a vibrant and growing next space innovation ecosystem. I am very pleased that the project presented by Loft with the support of Airbus relies on French suppliers, more than 60% of the value being created in France.”
Jean-Marc Nasr, Head of Airbus Space Systems, said, “This sale of our small LEO platform Arrow to Loft Orbital is a ringing endorsement of our strategy to develop mass manufacturing for the next space era. Our reliable platform is already proving its worth in orbit for OneWeb who have more than 60% of their fleet in orbit. We look forward to working with Loft Orbital to provide them with the best space technology possible – combining industrially-proven know-how with disruptive innovations – to serve their customers.”
Pierre-Damien Vaujour, CEO of Loft Orbital, said. “We are beyond excited about this procurement agreement with Airbus that is an industry first. Leveraging Airbus engineering experience and Airbus OneWeb Satellites production capabilities is enabling us to truly bring Loft's vision to life. While we are using this initial procurement to deliver to our customers who have ordered services based on a few tens of satellites, we see this as an opportunity to offer much larger constellation services to governments and companies worldwide. In addition, the level of support we have received in France, and the quality of the engineering talent, is simply unmatched and we are looking forward to growing the company here in Toulouse.”

Filed Under: Business Moves, Constellation, Contracts, Manufacturing, Satellites, SmallSat

Primary Sidebar

Most Read Stories

  • UPDATE 4: Virgin Orbit updates their "Start Me Up" mission anomaly
  • UPDATE 4: SpaceX changes date and time of the Starlink launch to January 15th from Vandenberg SFB — while SpaceX Falcon 9 propelled the OneWeb Launch 16 mission to orbit from Canaveral –
  • Cook Islands to get Vodafone Cook Islands' 4G+ networks via SES’s O3b mPOWER  
  • UPDATE 1: SpaceX sends Northrop Grumman's USSF-67 two satellite mission to orbit via a Falcon Heavy — Northrop Grumman comments
  • Ground Control develops satellite IoT Gateway for larger data payloads in remote locations

About Satnews

  • Contacts
  • History

Archives

  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020

Secondary Sidebar

x
Sign up Now (For Free)
Access daily or weekly satellite news updates covering all aspects of the commercial and military satellite industry.
Invalid email address
Notify Me Regarding ( At least one ):
We value your privacy and will not sell or share your email or other information with any other company. You may also unsubscribe at anytime.

Click Here to see our full privacy policy.
Thanks for subscribing!