Space firm on track to become South African unicorn

South African aerospace firm CubeSpace says it is on track to reach a valuation of $1 billion (R18 billion) and achieve dollar unicorn status.

Speaking to the Sunday Times, CubeSpace CEO and founder Mike-Alec Kearney explained how the firm had shifted from university to research to a globally competitive satellite technology company.

He said CubeSpace was growing its revenue by between 50% and 60% year-on-year. “We are on track to become a US dollar unicorn in the next five to seven years,” said Kearney.

CubeSpace was born out of academic research at Stellenbosch University. The firm manufactures high-precision satellite control systems and components.

It specialises in Attitude Determination and Control Systems (ADCS). ADCS systems help satellites orient themselves while in space by shifting their position in relation to the Earth, stars, and the sun.

CubeSpace has over 10 years’ experience in orbit and has accumulated over 250 customers across 30 countries. It has developed over 350 ADCS systems.

According to Kearney, the company has many commercial customers, as well as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) and the UAE Space Agency.

“For the UAE Space Agency, we are not just building a control system, they are building a lunar rover which is going to land on the moon,” Kearney said.

“We are building the computer and the electronics that drive the wheels of the rover.”

MyBroadband reported on CubeSpace’s activities when it announced the launch of a nanosatellite, ZA-AeroSat, in March 2017.

The company said the nanosatellite weighed just 2kg and would be launched as an additional payload together with a mission carrying supplies to the International Space Station (ISS).

The ZA-AeroSat is smaller than a shoebox, measuring 10cm x 10cm x 20cm. It was used to gather scientific measurements from the lower thermosphere — around 200km to 400km above Earth.

Prior to launch, it was transported to the Netherlands, where it was packed with other satellites before being sent to Nasa in the US.

South African tech cleaning up space

In 2016, CubeSpace helped develop a local satellite project and avionics for the two DebrisSats, which were built to remove space junk in orbit around Earth.

The experimental mission used cube satellites (cubesats), which acted as a net to capture and deorbit space junk.

The cubesats were small satellites developed by CubeSpace and Stellenbosch University to support the university in exploring commercial opportunities in space exploration.

According to Professor Herman Steyn, head of the Satellite Engineering Group in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at Stellenbosch University at the time, the project started in 2013.

“Our part took about 12 months to develop and to build the engineering and flight model avionics for the two DebrisSAT satellites,” said Steyn.

“The launch date is not finalised yet, but the aim is to launch from the International Space Station by mid-2017.”

Stellenbosch University employed 226 people in a group of companies with a combined turnover of R205 million through the venture.

According to Nasa, there were more than 500,000 pieces of space junk being monitored in Earth’s orbit at the time, with around 20,000 pieces being bigger than a cricket ball. Junk of this size poses a danger to space craft.