The South Australia: The Space to Be contingent at the International Astronautical Congress.
Credit: South Australian Space Industry Centre
What an incredible week we had in Sydney last week at the International Astronautical Congress (#IAC2025) representing Adelaide University. It was an extremely busy week, with bustling crowds at the largest international space conference.
We exhibited on the ‘South Australia: The Space to be’ stand. It was a real buzz, and a highlight for the ICC team was seeing the queues of people waiting to chat to our alum founders at their stands. AICRAFT, Blue Dwarf Space, HEX20, Paladin Space, Robinson Aerospace Systems and Safety From Space all exhibited. It was also great to see other ICC startups around the convention including Astroport Space Technologies, AFT Dynamics, GroundZero Space, RapidBeam, and ANT61.
Surrounded by some of the largest companies and influential people within the space industry, we were presented with a wealth of opportunity, which has led to a number of new partnerships and memorandums of understanding for several of our alumni.
Some of the highlights from the week included;
- Current Venture Catalyst Space participants Sai and Kathiravan from GroundZero Space presenting a paper on next generation tracking systems for enhanced space domain awareness and optimised space traffic management.
- HEX20 (VC Space 2021) with their own booth, a presence on the SA stand and on the UAE exhibit, promoting their collaboration with the UAE Space Agency on the Asteroid Lander Mission.
- AICRAFT (VC Space 2023) signing two memorandums of understanding (MoUs) with
- Takeme2space (TM2S), to integrate AICRAFT’s edge computing devices into TM2S’s satellite constellation infrastructure to provide a data centre in space;
- Omspace, to explore AICRAFT’s edge computing devices for Omspace’s propulsion, satellite systems, AI automation in aerospace, teaching and training workshops.
- The Australasian Space Innovation Institute (ASII) launching with operations officially commencing in January. The new national space-focused innovation centre is building on the success of the South Australian based SmartSat Cooperative Research Centre.
- Paladin Space (VC Space 2023) signing an MoU with the University of Padua (fourth oldest university in the world) to access their experimental data from the PICOSAT-1 and PICOSAT-2 satellite impact tests performed at their Hypervelocity Impact (HVI) facility. Paladin Space will analyse these fragments with their sensor suite, training their Machine Learning (ML) computer vision model to make it more accurate and effective at debris classification.
- A new partnership between RapidBeam (VC Space 2024), and Japanese space technology company WARPSPACE, which is set to accelerate the future of space communications. The organisations have signed an agreement to develop next-generation laser communication systems, which promise faster, more secure, and more reliable data transfer than today’s radio-based technologies.
These are all incredible achievements, and we look forward to seeing where these new partnerships lead.
Walking through the huge exhibition, we were amazed and proud of how far the South Australian space ecosystem has come in such a short time.
We hope we can continue to support the next big ideas in space and continue to be a part of such a dynamic and fast-moving sector.
A big thank you to the staff from the South Australian Space Industry Centre for hosting us on the Space to Be booth and creating such a fantastic environment to showcase what this state has to offer.
Ben Rowley
Program Manager, ICC.
