Accelerating and safeguarding the next era of space missions

As space becomes increasingly crowded, Astrion is making that expansion safe and sustainable

I was fortunate to attend the International Astronautical Congress in Sydney, where the Maldives announced the creation of a national space fund, evidence of how the race to orbit now includes players few would have imagined a decade ago.

Space is no longer the realm of superpowers alone. The Maldives’ $50 million initiative is part of a broader global surge, where governments and investors are turning to space to support various security, communications, and climate monitoring initiatives. From Turkey’s ambitious lunar program to Kenya’s expanding Earth-observation network, the space domain is becoming more and more crowded.

More than 70 space agencies now operate worldwide, alongside a fast-growing commercial sector that helped drive a record 259 launches in 2024. By year’s end, more than 11,000 satellites were in orbit, triple the number from just four years earlier.

In a crowded orbit, expertise matters

With thousands of spacecraft circling Earth, many from operators new to the field, low Earth orbit (LEO) is increasingly a congested, contested environment. Collisions, debris, and radio interference are no longer theoretical risks but daily operational challenges.

The recent debris-related incident that left three Chinese astronauts stranded aboard their space station underscores how even the most advanced programs remain vulnerable in this environment.

As the number of spacecraft climbs, so does the need for coordination: shared tracking systems, transparent data exchanges, and resilient infrastructure to prevent accidents. What once required a few nations to cooperate now demands global collaboration and trusted technical partners who can anticipate risk before it becomes reality.

Astrion helps established players and new entrants navigate this environment safely. Drawing on decades of experience across civil and national security space missions, Astrion delivers the modeling, testing, and risk analysis capabilities needed to keep spacecraft, sensors, and operators mission-ready and safe.

Enabling future success in space

Our heritage shows up in every phase of engineering development including test and evaluation. Astrion engineers model and simulate launch environments, analyze performance under extreme conditions, and validate flight hardware long before it ever leaves the ground. These capabilities help emerging programs identify and mitigate risk early, ensuring spacecraft are technically sound and interoperable across international and commercial networks.

That same precision extends to launch safety and mission assurance. Astrion is among a select group of organizations serving the U.S. Space Force’s New Entrant Certification Program, trusted to monitor and assess new rocket development, testing, and launch activities to reduce the risk of catastrophic incidents. Since 2021, National Security Space Launches supported by Astrion have achieved a 100 percent success rate, a testament to our team’s discipline and dependability.

Astrion also supports the safe return of launch equipment, applying our risk hazard analysis expertise to enable the safe launch and recovery and reuse of booster vehicles. In Australia, for instance, Astrion teamed with a local company to assist the Australian Space Agency in evaluating vehicle return operations across several launch sites, helping safely integrate reusable systems into Australia’s growing launch infrastructure.

To support human space exploration, Astrion plays a key role in advancing NASA’s exploration goals, providing launch systems testing and readiness support for Artemis II’s upcoming launch, the first crewed Space Launch Systems flight in NASA’s effort to establish a sustained human presence on the Moon.

Astrion also supports the next frontier of in-situ resource utilization, which uses local materials to sustain and expand exploration. Through our work with NASA’s Swamp Works program, a hands-on, lean development environment for innovation at the Kennedy Space Center, we are helping advance technologies for mobility, excavation, and additive manufacturing using simulated lunar regolith – research that could one day enable the construction of habitats and infrastructure directly on the Moon or Mars.

Whether ensuring rockets return safely, validating complex launch systems, or helping pioneer technologies for sustained lunar presence, Astrion applies a common goal: make every mission safer, faster, and more reliable. For new space programs stepping onto the global stage, that partnership can be the difference between a single milestone and a lasting presence in orbit.

The future of space will be shared by nations large and small, as well as private organizations. Keeping that future space domain safe and available will depend not just on vision, but on discipline, collaboration, and risk mitigation. With our deep experience across civil and national security space activities, Astrion stands ready to help the expanding space industry reach further and broaden its capabilities.

To learn more about Astion’s space capabilities, visit: https://astrion.us/space/.