The initiative is aligned with European space priorities on technological sovereignty and the circular space economy.

The technical core of the partnership merges Exotrail’s mobility platforms, including spacevan™, with Astroscale’s specialized servicing hardware and rendezvous-and-proximity-operations (RPO) technology.

The collaboration follows a study phase led by Exotrail under a France 2030 contract with the French space agency CNES that evaluated a deorbiting mission for a constellation satellite.

The partnership combines Exotrail’s mission leadership on vehicles and maneuvers with Astroscale France’s capture and close-proximity operations expertise.

The partnership aims to position France and Europe at the forefront of in-orbit servicing.

Astroscale France and Exotrail announced a strategic partnership on January 28, 2026 to develop and demonstrate controlled deorbiting capabilities for satellites in Low Earth Orbit.

The partners intend to execute their first joint demonstration mission before 2030 to remove a commercial satellite currently in orbit.

Surfaces such as the Moon and Mars are better mapped than the Earth’s seabed due to space exploration missions.

Unmanned and remote technologies are central for operating in space and seabed environments because they enable assessment of threats, environmental conditions, and operational dynamics without directly exposing humans to high risk.

Competition over economic resources in space introduces potential contention and elevates the strategic importance of defending the space domain.

Massimo Claudio Comparini identified that the space domain and the seabed share the same strategic and technological vulnerabilities and require common approaches to protection, monitoring, and operational capabilities.

Massimo Claudio Comparini is Managing Director of the Space Division at Leonardo.

Approximately 95% of global information flows transit through submarine cables.

Only about 25% of the world’s seabed is currently known.

Protecting critical space and submarine infrastructures requires processes, doctrines, and technologies capable of preventing, detecting, and countering hostile or accidental actions.

Space and seabed are both hostile environments that are difficult to explore and monitor continuously.

The renewed phase of lunar exploration is linked to prospects for extracting raw materials, including rare earth elements concentrated in specific geographic areas.

Space infrastructures support communications, navigation, and Earth observation services.

Submarine and space infrastructures are critical assets for economies, societies, and national security and their interruption would have systemic effects at national and international scales.

Oman has attracted about $4 billion in investment from international mining companies since 2020.

Oman has attracted OMR2 billion ($5 billion) to its space industry programme since 2023.

In November 2024 Oman signed an agreement with Airbus to build its first high-capacity communications satellite system.

Oman will use satellites to identify mineral resources such as copper, zinc and gold around the country.

Soud Al Shoaili is head of Oman’s space programme.

Oman produces about 1 million barrels a day of crude, which constitutes approximately 70 percent of its economy.

The MicroGEO satellite contracted by MB Petroleum and Astranis is expected to be launched later this year and will help in the operation of oil rigs.

OQ Gas Networks is a subsidiary of the Oman Investment Authority and owns and operates Oman’s 4,000 km gas pipeline grid.

Oman launched initiatives to improve connectivity in remote areas and to search for oil, gas and minerals following a three-day space conference in Muscat.

Petroleum Development Oman, in which Shell holds a 34 percent stake, is using satellite monitoring to help find oil reserves undetected by conventional methods.

OQ Gas Networks signed an agreement with Omantel to use satellites to monitor its gas pipeline network.

Omantel is Oman’s biggest telecom operator.

Astranis is a San Francisco-based satellite developer.

OQ Gas Networks plans to expand its pipeline network by 20 percent by the end of 2027.

MB Petroleum, an Omani private company, signed an agreement with Astranis to launch a MicroGEO satellite in a deal worth $200 million.

Pléiades Neo is Airbus’ high-resolution optical constellation used for defence, security, disaster management, civil engineering, environmental monitoring, and commercial services.

Skynopy's objective is to enable satellite operators to deploy and operate ground infrastructure faster and with greater flexibility while delivering higher responsiveness and data availability.

Integrating Skynopy’s ground station services into Airbus Defence and Space operations optimizes data acquisition and downlink performance through the OneAtlas platform, reducing the time between image acquisition and data availability.

The initial operational test supported real-time data downlink.

Skynopy's software-defined ground segment is designed to enable rapid deployment of new ground stations and flexible resource allocation.

Skynopy's ground-segment approach is fully software-defined and combines centralized orchestration and virtualized modem technologies.

Skynopy was founded in 2023.

The Airbus S950 satellite was first developed for the Pléiades Neo optical constellation.

An initial operational test by Skynopy deployed new capabilities within weeks and transitioned to operational service within months.

Skynopy secured a contract with Airbus Defence and Space to support enhancement of the ground segment for very high-resolution optical imagery services based on the Pléiades Neo constellation on Jan. 28.

Pléiades Neo satellites deliver native 30 cm resolution optical imagery.

DESIR will enable full sovereign control over critical systems while aiming to provide faster access to advanced solutions for end users within a sustainable industrial framework.

Tekever’s responsibility for the active SAR antenna builds on its expertise in inter-satellite links and high-performance SAR payloads.

Tekever is a member of the DESIR consortium alongside Loft Orbital and Thales Alenia Space.

Within the DESIR program, Tekever is responsible for the active SAR antenna.

The DESIR consortium was selected by the French Space Agency (CNES) and the Direction générale de l’armement (DGA) to develop a fully sovereign SAR capability for France.