Spaceflight Inc. and Rocket Factory Partner to Fly Sherpa OTVS on Future RFA Launches From Europe
Rendering of the RFA ONE rocket which is scheduled to start launching in 2023. Credit: RFA
At the International Astronautical Congress 2022 (IAC), Spaceflight Inc., the leading global launch services provider, today announced it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for upcoming launches with Rocket Factory Augsburg AG (RFA). The agreement formalizes the plan for Spaceflight to fly its Sherpa® orbital transfer vehicles (OTVs) and other rideshare payloads on upcoming RFA missions from a variety of European launch sites, including from facilities in the United Kingdom, French Guiana and others. The companies are targeting mid-2024 for their first launch.
“The demand for access to cost-effective, last-mile delivery launches is growing rapidly from customers with payloads of all sizes and types,” said Curt Blake, CEO and president of Spaceflight. “Having many different launch options across different price points, orbital destinations, and facility locations are all very important to our savvy spacecraft developer customers. RFA brings increased price competitiveness and launch frequency from many different launch locations throughout Europe. We’re looking forward to extending our launch vehicle portfolio for Sherpa OTVs and rideshare services to now include RFA ONE, and wish them well on their upcoming maiden flight.”
Leveraging its location in the hub of the German automobile manufacturing industry, RFA is minimizing launch system costs with its unique serial production and assembly approach. RFA ONE, a three-stage, 30-meter rocket can deliver up to 1,350 kg to a polar Earth orbit. The company successfully completed the first test campaign of its Helix flight configuration engine in July 2022, confirming its milestone traction towards service commercialization. RFA has already signed launch contracts with the German government and about a dozen customers for launches starting in 2023. The RFA ONE rocket is expected to launch up to 50 times a year in the future, delivering satellites into near-Earth orbit quickly and reliably at a highly competitive price point.
“Spaceflight pioneered and truly defined the rideshare market and we’re very excited to partner with them on future launches,” commented Jörn Spurmann, Chief Commercial Officer of RFA. “Together with Spaceflight’s unmatched launch and in-space transportation expertise, we can provide the industry with more launch flexibility and options for competitively priced launches to LEO and beyond.”
Spaceflight’s Sherpa family of space vehicles are designed to minimize development timelines while maximizing launch schedule reliability and mission assurance. Beyond functioning as a port expander, the modular and flexible transportation vehicles bridge the gap between where a launch vehicle drops its satellites off and the satellites’ final destination orbit – whether that’s LEO, trans-lunar and low-lunar orbits, or beyond to geosynchronous equatorial orbit (GEO). In addition to precise orbit insertion, Sherpa OTVs support payload hosting, as well as in-space servicing, such as spacecraft maintenance, infrastructure development, and debris mitigation.
Earlier this month, Spaceflight successfully launched Sherpa-LTC, its chemical propulsive OTV onboard a SpaceX Starlink mission. The high-thrust propulsive Sherpa successfully deployed from the Falcon 9 and is targeting a 310-kilometer circular orbit, before igniting and transporting a customer payload to a 1,000-kilometer circular orbit. Previously, the company launched 50 payloads in 2021 from three different Sherpa OTVs, establishing a strong history of success with the program.