Author: Scanway
Publication date:
Scanway will join the prestigious group of companies participating in the maiden flight of Europe’s newest launch vehicle, the Ariane 6. Work on the rocket began in 2014, and the design is the direct successor to the Ariane 5 rocket, which completed a total of 117 flights between 1996 and 2023, 112 of which were successful. The European Space Agency (ESA) has set the launch date for July 9 of this year, and the launch will take place at the European spaceport in French Guiana. The rocket will carry a total of 18 payloads. Ariane 6 is a key project for maintaining the independence and flexibility of Europe’s space capabilities in terms of launching payloads into Earth orbit. As part of the YPSat project, Scanway will supply a dual-camera optical system designed to monitor the deployment of the rocket’s main fairing during launch and to record the deployment of payloads into low Earth orbit. In this way, Scanway will provide critical data for analyzing the inaugural flight of Europe’s newest launch vehicle.
ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher announced the official date of the maiden flight of Europe’s newest launch vehicle, Ariane 6, during the ILA Air Show in Berlin—the first launch attempt will take place on July 9 of this year.
– This is a very important event for the entire European space market, which urgently needs its own independent solutions for launching payloads into orbit. We are proud that Scanway and our proprietary optical solutions will play a role in such a significant European space mission. As part of the YPSat project—an ESA initiative aimed at capturing the most important stages of the Ariane 6 rocket launch— we will supply two high-quality cameras that will record the moment the rocket’s main fairing deploys and the ejection of the payloads mounted on the rocket as it ascends to an altitude of approximately 600 km – comments Jędrzej Kowalewski, Chairman of the Management Board of Scanway S.A.
– It’s worth noting that the maiden flight of the previous Ariane 5 rocket in 1996 ended in failure, and market experts estimate the chances of success for the first Ariane 6 flight at roughly 50%. We’ll likely find out the outcome of this maiden flight as early as July 9, and our cameras will capture the result. We’re keeping our fingers crossed for the mission’s complete success. – adds Jędrzej Kowalewski.
The Ariane 6 rocket was built by the European space company ArianeGroup, a joint venture between Airbus Defence and Space and Safran. The project has been under development since 2014 as part of the European Space Agency’s (ESA) space program. The goal of the launch vehicle, aside from serving as a direct successor to the venerable Ariane 5 rocket, is to increase Europe’s competitiveness in the commercial spaceflight market and to offer an alternative to the popular Falcon 9 rocket from the American company SpaceX.
YPSat (Young Professionals Satellite) is a European project aimed at capturing key phases of the Ariane 6 rocket’s maiden flight. As part of this project, Scanway will supply a dual-camera optical system that, during the first phase of the flight (approx. 3 min. and 30 seconds after launch) will monitor the separation of the rocket’s main fairing, and during a later phase of the flight (approximately 66 minutes after launch) will record the separation of the payloads mounted on the rocket.
– In 2024, we’re expecting as many as four space missions involving Scanway. Ariane 6 is this year’s most important European mission, while the upcoming launch of EagleEye, carrying our optical telescope, is a landmark project in the entire history of the Polish space sector. Scanway’s participation in both of these projects clearly reflects not only the company’s dynamic growth, but also our ambitions and growing recognition in the domestic market, as well as in the European and global markets, since the launch of the Ariane 6 rocket will be watched by virtually the entire global space industry community. – says Mikołaj Podgórski, COO and co-founder of Scanway.
Scanway develops and commercializes two business lines: products for the space sector (optical instruments for Earth observation and satellite self-diagnostics) and for industry (vision systems). Thanks to the STAR VIBE mission and the launch in early 2023 of a satellite equipped with a vision system and an optical telescope developed and manufactured in the company’s laboratories, Scanway has acquired “flight heritage”—confirming the reliability and functionality of its solutions in space conditions. The Polish satellite regularly captures new images of Earth, and the Company receives the best images from space ever obtained by Polish research instruments.
About Scanway:
Scanway is a Polish company operating in the field of observation technology and computer vision. The company develops and commercializes two business lines: products for the space sector (optical instruments for Earth observation and satellite self-diagnostics) and for the manufacturing industry (machine vision systems).
Scanway is the only company in Poland—and one of a dozen or so companies worldwide—to have developed a comprehensive technology for Earth observation and the self-diagnostics of satellites and spacecraft. The company offers complete systems based on its own proprietary algorithms for image processing and analysis. As part of the STAR VIBE mission in 2023, a satellite was launched carrying a imaging system and an optical telescope developed and manufactured in the company’s laboratories; thereby establishing flight heritage and delivering the best images from space ever obtained by Polish satellite instruments. The company is also a key consortium member in Poland’s largest space projects, including, among others, EagleEye and PIAST.
The Company also aims to apply space-based solutions in the manufacturing industry. Scanway provides technological solutions tailored to the needs of medium and large manufacturing plants, primarily in the area of quality control. In October 2023, Scanway made its debut on the NewConnect market. For more information: https://scanway.pl/
Contact for the media, investors, and analysts:
Mardoniusz Maćkowiak
+48 605 959 539
mardoniusz.mackowiak@ccgroup.pl