The tagline Reusable, Affordable, Integrated reads like that of a small consumer product, but for The Exploration Company, this is its goal for the next generation of space travel.
The European aerospace industry startup develops reusable, launcher-agnostic space systems, including the Nyx spacecraft family and high-performance rocket propulsion systems, designed to transport cargo – and eventually crew – to destinations in Earth orbit and beyond.
Its latest mission, Mission Bikini, showcased its orbital demonstration capsule, progressed from an initial concept to flight hardware in just 9 months – a rapid development process tied to its to an integrated engineering approach.
“At The Exploration Company, our mission is to make space more accessible through reusable technology,” says Daniel Prudente Martins, principal EWIS & electrical interfaces, Nyx Avionics, The Exploration Company.
“Achieving this requires an advanced, scalable engineering environment.”
The Exploration Company is using Siemens’ Designcenter software for mechanical design, Simcenter software for advanced engineering simulation, Capital software for electrical systems design, enabling the creation and validation of electrical architectures across the development process and Teamcenter software for product lifecycle management and collaboration.
Together, these solutions enable it to operate a connected engineering environment which helps integrate mechanical, electrical and simulation workflows with Teamcenter to manage the data across the full product lifecycle.
This allows the company to model and optimise complex processes with changes in one domain reflected across the others, giving improved data consistency, enhanced traceability and reduced development risk.
A key benefit is that this enables a comprehensive Digital Twin for earlier validation and improved mission assurance. The integrated Siemens Xcelerator toolchain also helps support certification requirements typical in aerospace programs.
“Working with Siemens and adopting its best-in-class industrial software is helping us connect our engineering processes, reduce rework, accelerate development and streamline manufacturing as we scale our operations,” concluded Prudente Martins.
A comprehensive digital twin is at the heart of The Exploration Company’s mission, and is helping it accelerate development and meet the rigorous demands of next generation space programs, ready for future space travel.
