Accion Systems, founded in 2014, is a spacecraft propulsion company that develops advanced in-space propulsion systems for satellites, focusing on scalability, performance, and efficiency. Their flagship product, TILE (Tiled Ionic Liquid Electrospray) uses proprietary ion electrospray thrusters. Accion Systems has partnered with organizations like NASA, Boeing, and NanoAvionics. Associated keywords: electric propulsion, ion engines, satellite maneuverability, smallsat propulsion.
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Accion Systems has raised a total of $36,000,000 in funding.
Accion Systems first flew the TILE thruster system on the student-built cubesat Irvine 01, which launched in November 2018 on a Rocket Lab Electron rocket.
Accion Systems has multiple spacecraft, including student-built cubesats, scheduled for launch in 2020 that will use TILE thrusters.
Shasta Ventures led Accion Systems’ $7,500,000 Series A round in 2016.
Accion Systems’ total funding figure of $36,000,000 includes $14,000,000 in awards from the U.S. Defense Department and NASA.
Accion Systems raised $11,000,000 in a Series B funding round to increase production of its electric thrusters for smallsats.
NASA awarded a $3,900,000 Tipping Point program contract to Accion Systems to demonstrate that its thrusters can replace a cold-gas propulsion system on a cubesat.
The NASA Tipping Point contract funds a flight test of Accion Systems’ thruster technology in 2021 on a cubesat based on the Mars Cube One (MarCO) spacecraft.
Accion Systems won $3,900,000 to develop ion electrospray thrusters with the same performance as the cold-gas thrusters used on NASA’s MarCO cubesats, but with less mass and power.
Accion Systems is developing electric thrusters that use ionic liquids based on technologies developed at MIT.