What Europe must do in Space
Space: what emerged from Limes' conversation with Enrico Savio, Leonardo's chief strategy and market intelligence officer
To challenge actors of the caliber of Bezos, Musk or Google we need unified responses from Europe in space.
The Space Economy has highlighted a big gap, especially between the US and Europe. If in the United States there is a complementarity between the institutional and the private / commercial component, elsewhere it still does not happen or only to a lesser extent.
"If the individual European countries, medium-small powers, do not endow themselves with national strategies in the field of space and do not put them into a system in a community dimension, they risk complete economic and geostrategic dependence". This was underlined by Enrico Savio, Leonardo's chief strategy and market intelligence officer, in the issue of Limes entitled "Space serves us to make war".
This is what emerged from Leonardo's manager's conversation with Limes , the geopolitics magazine directed by Lucio Caracciolo.
THE ADVANTAGE OF THE USA MODEL WITH SPACEX, BLUE ORIGIN AND VIRGIN GALACTIC
"In the galaxy of actors that animate the Space economy, giants such as SpaceX (Elon Musk), Blue Origin (Jeff Bezos) or Virgin Galactic (Richard Branson) stand out, active both in the launch sector and in the growing one of satellites, which is Alphabet (Google) is also interested ”, highlighted Savio.
The geopolitical space competition is in fact more fierce now due to the entry and growing role of private individuals in the space sector, thanks also to the lowering of costs.
On the other hand, the competition from SpaceX ("supported by public mechanisms"), Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic had also made reference to the CEO of Leonardo, Alessandro Profumo, at the conference "G20-Italy for space, the economy, industry, the rules ” of the Leonardo Civiltà delle Macchine Foundation.
"None of us have the assets of Elon Musk who can field two billion, which he can afford, because they are his two billion", had emphasized Profumo. It is a risk that a company manager could not decide to run because "he would be kicked out of the board". We need "unified responses at a European level or else we will all go out, not just Leonardo", Leonardo's number one had warned in Europe.
THE ROLE OF NASA'S STRATEGIC INCUBATOR
“The progressive miniaturization of satellites is in fact determining the reduction of manufacturing, launch and management costs and the consequent exponential increase in their number in Earth orbits. These companies do a great service to the United States, because by bearing the industrial and financial costs of developing new space technologies, they allow NASA, and therefore the US government, to carve out a role of coordination and supervision. In other words, a strategic incubator ”, points out Leonardo's chief strategy.
SPACE: RISK OF SUFFERING EXTERNAL HEGEMONY
Therefore the countries of the Old Continent risk being left behind or on the sidelines in the race for space. "We can rely on the benevolence of American hegemony – assuming it is that we choose or is imposed on us – but any external hegemony, especially if it is no longer at the center of others' horizon as during the Cold War, involves making interests that are not necessarily your own. It is a cooperation that can start immediately on a pragmatic level, without the need for complex formalizations. But that requires bi- or multilateral agreements ”, highlighted Savio. An example of this is the recent Quirinal Treaty between France and Italy.
THE FRANCE-ITALY QUIRINAL TREATY, SPACE CHAPTER
In addition to the Franco-Italian Quirinal Treaty , signed on November 26 in Rome by French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, which includes an entire article on space, there is also a specific margin agreement on the space sector .
Vittorio Colao, Minister of Technology, Innovation and Digital Transition, and Bruno Le Maire, French Minister of Economy, Finance and Recovery, have in fact signed an agreement on launchers at the end of "three months of intense negotiations". As stated in the work plan accompanying the Quirinal Treaty, France and Italy undertake to "promote mutually advantageous institutional and industrial collaboration in the sector of access to space".
This new agreement between Paris and Rome "consolidates Franco-Italian cooperation on launchers, built on future Ariane 6 and Vega C launchers", states the joint note.
THE LACK OF THE FRANCO-ITALIAN UNDERSTANDING ACCORDING TO LEONARDO'S CHIEF STRATEGIST
“This treaty, which on the whole is a positive fact, highlights a great lack. Anyone in the EU can define themselves as “Europe” and claim to represent it, precisely because there is no strategic vision of the role that the Union should play in the new geopolitical-spatial and technological matches. It is not only a regulatory deficit, but a conceptual one. So operational ”, remarks Enrico Savio.
THE KOUROU SPACE CENTER
Precisely for this reason, according to Savio, “the Kourou site in French Guiana cannot be called a European base, even though it is in use by the European Space Agency (ESA). Those who claim a leading role in the creation of a European space capacity must take responsibility for it ”.
THE STRATEGICITY OF THE PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN ROME AND PARIS IN THE SPACE
However France, Germany and Italy are the three largest space nations in Europe.
And this is why for Leonardo's manager if “there are two European countries whose partnership in the space field makes sense, those are France and Italy: the only ones that, with the partial addition of Germany, have significant industrial capabilities in the sector. The Quirinal Treaty comes after years of efforts on the Italian side to consolidate a relationship with Paris on Space, in order to aggregate a critical mass. These efforts have already produced in 2005 the Space Alliance between Leonardo and Thales which in the sectors of platforms, programs and services is giving extremely valid results ”.
THE ROLE OF LEONARDO
Finally, according to Enrico Savio, Italy can play a leading role in Space given that "as a country we have what it takes".
“Leonardo is a global player operating in four domestic markets – Italy, the United Kingdom, the United States and Poland – and is particularly suitable for the new race for Space, both nationally and in Europe. Without excluding active participation in transatlantic space programs, in the civil and military dimensions which, as we have seen, are difficult to separate. With the Be Tomorrow 2030 plan, the group has given itself a strategic platform that requires courageous choices. We thus hope to contribute to a national strategic debate that we urgently need ”.
Today the former Finmeccanica company covers 70% of the Italian space sector, with 5 thousand people (direct and indirect) for a turnover worth 1.6 billion euros per year.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/che-cosa-deve-fare-leuropa-nello-spazio/ on Sun, 13 Feb 2022 16:29:13 +0000.