CORE BUSINESS
Space Cargo Unlimited is developing REV1, the first space factory for Earth. REV1 is a pressurized and reusable European space vehicle designed for low Earth orbit missions lasting from a few weeks to several months. It will enable the automated manufacturing of high-value products that are impossible to produce on Earth, for a variety of institutional and commercial customers in fields such as pharmaceuticals, agriculture, new materials, and electronics.
The core module of REV1, named BentoBox, is set to launch in the fourth quarter of 2025, marking the beginning of Space Cargo Unlimited’s space factory services for its customers. The entire system will be designed and owned by Space Cargo Unlimited.
BentoBox and all key subsystems will be manufactured internally by the company, while the broader vehicle will be developed in strategic collaboration with its partner Thales Alenia Space.
PRODUCTS & SERVICES
Space Cargo Unlimited offers turn-key pressurised round-trip missions from launch platforms around the world for all users believing in the assets of in-space testing and manufacturing. With a portfolio ranging from its own one-of-a-kind fully automated, pressurised returning space factory to suborbital missions on new space vehicles, as well as established platforms such as ISS, Space Cargo Unlimited offers a comprehensive range of modern science applications as well as manufacturing opportunities in space. SCU business partners profit from a unique space operation profile and payload service system at the highest commercial market standard.
SCU business partners profit from a unique space operation profile and payload service system at the highest commercial market standard.
TECHNICAL MEANS
Building on the expertise of major space players and institutional pilot programs, SCU pioneers towards the industrialization of LEO. For this, SCU invested recent years into key technologies and industrial enablers which guarantee commercial production of assets at scale. New digital high data communication and AI payload services like the SpaceLink and SpaceOS, the Space-Boot-Camp based on its published “Guided Evolution” method, the world first returning in-space thruster test-bed, ultra-high-power and temperature payload bus systems are just few technologies mastered to see REV1 as the revolution in LEO.
Beyond REV1, SCU has strategic partnerships with vehicles operators and leveraging the high-level expertise of the European industry, Space Cargo Unlimited develops comprehensive expertise in complex microgravity project management and funding. Space Cargo Unlimited has partner teams in France, Germany, Italy, and the USA, with a network covering nearly all major actors in space infrastructures worldwide.
MAIN CUSTOMERS
SCU customers vary from institutional organisations, commercial enterprises interested in specific performance enhancements in bioproducts & materials, to high-tech applications and key technologies to be tested and validated in space.
MAJOR SPACE PROJECTS
In November 2019, the SCU launched red wine to the International Space Station for a year-long mission. The goal was to better the taste and composition of wine while ageing in the extreme conditions offered by space.
In December 2019, SCU exposed vine calluses to several minutes of weightlessness aboard a Blue Origin New Shepard spacecraft before returning to Earth. SCU was interested in commissioning a new scientific protocol, called “Self-Guided Evolution” allowing to provoke a high evolutionary rate of organisms in a space environment.
In March 2020, SCU transported 320 vine plants (CANES) to the International Space Station for a duration of 10 months. The goal of this mission is to trigger when threatened by stress the harsh environment. CANES lead to new variants of vine plants which showed enhanced resistance against attacks by fungi and mildew in lab conditions. SCU and its partners (ISVV, FAU and Mercier) started in field testing this year and targets to sell their new varieties beginning 2024.
These missions are part of the program WISE (Vitus Vinum in Spatium Experientia). Space Cargo Unlimited mission WISE program is developing new models and technology to tackle the future of agriculture and food by leveraging the effect of microgravity on complex biological systems. Mission WISE is the first comprehensive, privately led applied research program in space, aimed at reinventing the future of agriculture.
The identification of significant economic shortcomings in current existing platforms inspired SCU in the creation of the space factory platform of the future called REV1. Latest missions targeted the in-space validation of REV1 specific key technologies.
