Australia at the 37th Space Symposium — Colorado Springs
April 2022 saw the 37th Space Symposium take place in Colorado Springs. This year saw a strong Australian contingent take part thanks to Team Defence Australia taking a lead, here we share some of the insights to this international space event.
The 37th Space Symposium took place at The Broadmoor, Colorado Springs, Colorado USA, with over 10,000 space industry professionals from all over the world in attendance. With COVID restrictions reduced, it meant that a strong Australian contingent could attend, to show what the Australia is achieving in the space industry.
This was more than an opportunity to network with some of the largest players in the global space industry, it was a chance to share ideas, understand current policy trends and understand the future direction the industry may take.
The general consensus was that the event went really well from an Australian perspective with the lineup to the Australian stands barista ensuring that all the key players made their way to see what innovations Australia was sharing.
Industry Developments
A number of companies took the opportunity to announce new collaborations at the event, including Queensland based, Gilmour Space Technologies, who announced that they would be supporting LatConnect 60 (LC60), an Earth observation and data fusion company based in Perth, Australia, to build and launch the first microsatellite in a planned high-resolution hyperspectral imaging constellation.
The Australian companies announced the HyperSight 60 constellation agreement at the Symposium with Venkat Pillay, LC60 CEO and Founder saying that, “HyperSight 60 will deliver geospatial insights for mid-latitude areas at a level of detail and frequency not possible with other commercial remote sensing systems. The addition of Gilmour Space to the LC60 team contributes significantly to the future success of our ambitious plans.”
Gilmour weren’t the only ones announcing collaborations with a joint Statement of Intent between the Australian Space Agency and NASA being signed at the event. The signing, which supports the recent budget announcement to deliver Australia’s first ever National Space Mission for Earth Observation, highlights opportunities for Australia and the US to work together.
Minister for Science and Technology Melissa Price said the signing was an important part of locking in Australia’s access to the valuable data we rely on, as well as our place in the global space community.
“For us to unleash the full power of Earth observation we need to work with our closest international partners to share data and learn from one another,” Minister Price said.
“The United States has long been a global leader in land imaging from space,” she added.
Sydney based company Arlula also had a successful symposium, signing an agreement to work with Argentinian Earth Observation company Satellogic. Arlula who provide a user friendly single point of access to a network of global satellite imagery, will now have access to Satellogic’s extensive imagery capability.
Australian Flavour
A large number of Australian SME’s and Start-Ups took the opportunity to participate in the event, with, Southern Launch GM, Sales, Peter Williams, saying that it was “one of the best conferences I’ve been to.” With the Team Defence Australia delegation making up one of the largest Australian delegations to attend a global trade show, there was plenty of Australian innovation on show.
The official delegation was made up of over 40 Australian Space Companies and 150 delegates. There was an even larger Australian presence with a number of locals there under their own steam or supporting other organisations.
According to the CEO of High Earth Orbit Robotics (HEO), William Crowe, the event went “really well.”
“Seeing someone in person precipitates real actions and deals. Our main goal was to spread awareness, but I feel we went a step further and have made serious progress on a few deals,” added Crowe.
Sentiments echoed by Co-Founder and CEO of Arlula, Sebastian Chaoui who said that the event was one of the most valuable business trips he had ever done.
“I’ve been to conferences in the US before, but nothing matches the sheer size of the space symposium and the number of opportunities here as well,” said Chaoui.
According to Chaoui the Australian exhibit was one of the largest outside the primes which along with the great coffee meant a steady stream of interest.
“What was remarkable was that no other nation had as much presence here except for obviously the US and everyone wanted to talk to the Australian companies. Everyone wanted to do business with us,” added Chaoui.
According to the Managing Director of LeoLabs Australia, Terry van Haren, the three meeting rooms available to the Australian contingent were in constant use.
“We were able to ensure that our customers and stakeholders from around the world understood that LeoLabs was going global with a sovereign Australian and globally integrated subsidiary taking form in Australia. We had significant interest from especially the US Government, Space Force and Pacific Command and Pacific Fleet in our planned radar builds in Australia and the Indo-Pacifc region,” added van Haren.
The team from Hypersonix were also in attendance and felt that the event was much bigger than expected and that they learnt so much from being there.
“It was so nice to meet with people from all over the world that we only saw in video calls before,” said Hypersonix head of marketing Nina Patz.
“The atmosphere was amazing, everyone enjoyed being there. I was really happy to learn that companies from all over the world came to the Hypersonix stand because they wanted to congratulate us on the CRC-P (Cooperative Research Centres Projects grant) announcement from the week before and offer their expertise in high temperature composites and other specific areas required for the project,” added Patz.
Global Industry
There were a wide range of speakers and presentations at the event, with industry, government agencies and national bodies all represented. NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy was one of the most notable from an Australian perspective, having spent time in Australia with Nova Systems as the director space technology and policy before moving to NASA.
Peter Beck from RocketLab, and Head of the Australian Space Agency, Enrico Palmero, joined what was a who’s who in the global space industry.
From an Australian perspective, both Chaoui and Crowe were surprised at how welcoming the event was and that Australian industry can compete on the global space market.
“I saw more than one US space business with their representatives meeting with just Australian companies for the entire day,” said Crowe.
“We had the opportunity to pitch to CEOs of big aerospace primes and high level decision makers. It was just fantastic,” added Chaoui.
The team from Hypersonix also felt that the event went well with Patz, saying that they were “overwhelmed with how busy and popular our stand was. This was our first time exhibiting in the US and all people that came through to our stand were of such high calibre, we were really impressed.”
With the federal government continuing to announce support for space projects, the chase to visit the space symposium has put Australian industry firmly on the map with many attendees planning for next year’s event already.
