A meeting between the CEO of a space start-up and a UTS Director led to a mutually beneficial collaboration that will forever alter the way the Australian space industry works.
The commercialisation of the Australian space sector is light years away from where it was just three years ago.
It was around then that UTS Tech Lab Director of Business Development Roger Kermode first met with Australian high-tech start-up Space Machines Company (SMC) CEO Rajat Kulshrestha who shared a vision to build a business capable of inspecting, repairing, relocating, servicing, upgrading and disposing of spacecraft to create a more sustainable space industry.
The timing of the meeting coincided with the announcement by the previous Federal Government that it aimed to triple the national space economy from AU$4 billion to AU$12 billion and create 20,000 jobs by 2030. The State Government of the day argued NSW was best placed “economically, politically and geographically” to maximise the benefits to business from this new space era.
Space Machines Company Optimus Spacecraft
Yet while SMC’s pathway was clear, it became obvious that its dual goals of technological advancement and commercial viability would require a supporting partner with access to academic and technical expertise as well as cutting-edge facilities, equipment and workshop facilities.
The collaboration unfolded in sync with UTS’s strategic initiative to amplify investment in industry partnerships, particularly by establishing innovation precincts tailored to fulfill the requirements of NSW’s broader innovation strategy. The strategic initiative seeks to cultivate best-practice research models, fostering a dynamic culture of collaboration and innovation within the university and its partner networks.
Previously, siloed thinking paired with a reluctance to collaborate between universities and industry meant many industry players viewed Australia’s tertiary providers primarily as a source of talent rather than places to further develop and commercialise technology.
But UTS Tech Lab’s very purpose was to highlight what could be achieved when industry and universities partnered to push boundaries and achieve groundbreaking outcomes.
Having discerned SMC’s individual needs, UTS Tech Lab was able to develop an innovation ecosystem that saw SMC provided with access to state-of-the-art equipment that would otherwise have to be rented or purchased.
As a direct result of this new approach to collaboration with industry, UTS Tech Lab constructed a bespoke facility on campus where the design and fitout were detailed specifically to accommodate SMC’s next generation of satellites. Like-minded partners and suppliers were actively recruited to become neighbours and enable an innovation ecosystem built around the lab and clean room occupied by SMC.
UTS Tech Lab’s academic team was approached with the opportunity to work alongside SMC to undertake the advanced vibration testing of their satellites at Tech Lab necessary to qualify them for launch. Tech Lab’s Multi-Axial-Simulation-Table (MAST) was utilised to undertake a static load test on SMC’s ‘Optimus’ spacecraft where it successfully mimicked launch conditions ahead of the upcoming SpaceX Transporter 10 rideshare launch.
Typically designed to simulate earthquakes rather than simulating the constant load of 12-plus g-force that occurs during launch, the bespoke test was designed to simulate the launch load and can now be used to test satellites for future missions.
Image (L-R): Assoc Prof Ben Halkon, Peter Brown (UTS Senior Project Engineer) , Paul Hilton (SMC Mission Manager), Murali Shan (SMC Mechanical Engineer), Kenny Ng (SMC Manufacturing Engineer)
Rajat Kulsrestha, Space Machines Company CEO, says having the opportunity to forge such a close and constructive collaboration with UTS Tech Lab put a rocket under SMC’s program to launch Optimus.
It was fantastic to be able to develop our program out of UTS Tech Lab’s top class, purpose-built facility and have the exposure to the exceptional expertise of their people at the heart of their innovation ecosystem, Rajat says. The collaboration was a critical factor in getting our spacecraft through the rigorous pre-launch testing to be ready for deployment.
With the collaboration now in its third year, UTS Tech Lab and SMC are working together to complete a shared use facility for manufacturing and testing of larger satellites of up to 500kg, nearly twice the 270kg Optimus payload.
The facility will have the ability to be used by groups both inside UTS and out – including other universities and companies – as a means of sharing operating and maintenance costs and generating outcomes that would otherwise be impossible.
Dr Roger Kermode, UTS Faculty of Engineering and IT Director of Business Development, says there are other ways UTS Tech Lab is helping industry to push into new frontiers and achieve groundbreaking outcomes well beyond the use of loaned facilities and equipment.
In addition to creating new jobs and new research opportunities for researchers, forging closer relationships with industry partners also provides a host of internship and graduate opportunities for students, he says.
Currently, over 20 per cent of SMC employees come from UTS and SMC is now on the cusp of effecting a critical step change to the Australian space industry when at full capacity will result in flying at least three to four missions per year and having a permanent presence in space, he says.
We know that SMC needs the right sorts of employees, trained the right way to meet their needs. By working closely with Space Machines team to create internships and capstone projects we unlock the means for SMC to identify interested students and give them a trial run on a project that is low cost to [the business] and allows the student to work in interesting areas that both gain the academic credit and also the chance to impress a future employer.
This dramatically increases the opportunities for Australian space companies to fly their payloads. We will have a genuine sovereign space industry that our nascent space supply chain companies can use to deliver payloads into and in which students can embark on space-related studies confident that they will have a have a meaningful high-value job waiting for them upon graduation.
Roger Kermode, UTS Engineering & IT Director of Business Development.
UTS Tech Lab Director, Professor Robert Fitch says the partnership with SMC exemplifies the core principles guiding Tech Lab’s approach to industry collaboration and a prime example of what can be achieved when universities and industry are open to capturing the value from the IP they each generate while working together to achieve the best outcome.
“The whole of these sorts of collaborations is so much bigger than the sum of its parts,” Professor Fitch says. “The ripple effect is enormous, with positive outcomes cascading throughout Tech Lab and Space Machines Company in particular and Australia’s fledging space industry in general which it is helping to establish for generations to come.”