In the 20th century, the Italian space sector appeared as a niche of excellence, a remarkable reservoir of know-how and technology that was expressed almost exclusively in international collaborations. The historical heritage of the Italian space sector has its roots in the 1960s, with the National Research Council’s San Marco project and the activity of the Aerospace Engineering Department of the University of Rome La Sapienza, created and directed for a long time by Luigi Broglio. The importance of astrophysics research within the remarkable Italian School of Physics must also be emphasized. We are therefore dealing with a high-level sector that has long remained rather discreet, because it is linked to a community of researchers and industrialists operating in a relatively closed circle at the national level.
To examine the Italian space sector, we must start with the numbers. The budget of the Italian Space Agency is about 1 billion euros while the Italian part of the European recovery plan, the PNRR, dedicates more than 2 billion euros to space
The rise of the Italian space sector in the 21st century
During the 21st century the Italian space sector has reached technological and symbolic milestones that appear as crucial passages in the rise of the sector. The launch of the Vega rocket on February 13, 2012 certainly represents a topical moment
The participation of Italian astronauts in the various manned missions will also contribute to embodying space to public opinion. In this regard, it is worth mentioning astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti, the first Italian woman to fly in November 2014: this event is generating widespread interest and reinforcing the perception of space in Italy.
Finally, one should note that in 2018 a law was passed to organize the space sector, which centralizes decisions under the authority of the head of government (president of the Council of Ministers) by establishing a steering committee for space policy. Historically, the Italian space sector was characterized by an institutional logic of research and development with a space agency, the ASI, placed under the authority of the Ministry of Higher Education and Research
There is also another element related to industry. In 2007, a Franco-Italian joint venture was set up based on the merger between the space activities of Alcatel and those of the Italian holding company Finmeccanica. This operation produced the current structure of the space alliance between the French group Thales and the Italian group Leonardo, heirs to these holdings, around the two joint ventures ThalesAleniaSpace and Telespazio. This move is far from insignificant, as it forced Italy’s main satellite producer, Alenia, to enter into a close cooperative relationship with the French partner, though it would take almost a decade for an integrated bilateral dynamic to be established. In this respect, it is important to note the structuring aspect of Franco-Italian cooperation in security telecommunications: the agreements between Athena-Fidus and Sicral will solidify industrial cooperation within ThalesAleniaSpace, with the possibility of synergies and access to a dedicated public market
In addition, it is worth mentioning how space activities have been repositioned within the Leonardo holding company. While the agreement with France left only 33 % of the satellite production joint venture in Italian hands, one might have feared a certain “denationalization” of TAS-I, in other words that the minority nature of the company would call into question the perception of the existence of a national champion in satellite construction by the various Italian players, to the benefit of other companies. There was certainly a moment of hesitation, but TAS-I has managed to return to the forefront. This benefits and contributes to the strengthening of space in Italy in general, but it also repositioned itself as a positive brand within Leonardo. It is important to remember that the Leonardo group is the result of a complicated history. The former Finmeccanica appeared as a public holding of medium-sized technology companies each with its specificities and with relative autonomy for its different units like Selex, Datamat, Oto Melara or Alenia Aeronautica. The plan to transform this mix into Leonardo in 2016 coincided with a plan, carried by former CEO Mauro Moretti, to further integrate the different parts. This resulted in the disappearance of the various company identities and a more generic and global approach under the Leonardo brand. This operation was mostly negative for the traditional brands of a group that appeared to be reduced to its role as a helicopter manufacturer (Agusta Westland), thus diminishing the autonomy of the former holding companies. But it has had a paradoxical effect on Telespazio and ThalesAleniaSpace. Due to the international control sharing agreement with the French group Thales, the autonomy of these companies survived the centralizing will of the Moretti era. After the appointment of Alessandro Profumo to the group’s management in 2017, the space part of Leonardo was able to benefit greatly from the sector’s national and international growth. While in terms of financial results, the group’s space activity weighs relatively little compared to defense electronics, helicopters or aeronautics, in terms of perception, space has become since the end of the 2010 decade a strong identity of the company, which thus projects itself as an advanced producer of technology while also benefiting from a growth dynamic. The main space leaders of the group, Massimo Comparini and Luigi Pasquali, have played a key role in this dynamic of strategic revival of space within Leonardo, an element that is far from insignificant given the importance of the industrial player in an Italian ecosystem that has always been characterized by the ability of public groups to instill a global strategy to all players
It should also be noted that a large part of Italian space is located in the region of Rome
If the companies controlled by Leonardo appear to be the industrial leaders of the sector (Telespazio, TAS, but also Avio, in which Leonardo has a 29.6 % stake), we also note the growth of other players. For example, in the case of contracts for the new Iride constellation, OHB Italia and Argotec are the prime contractors for the first tranches. The emergence of these smaller players in an important public contract such as the Iride program is an indication of the growth of all the players in the sector, while various institutions are mobilizing to ensure that the fabric of Italian SMEs, characterized by its dynamism, can be inserted into the “space economy”, as observed during the recent “New Space Economy European Expoforum” organized in Rome in November 2022.
These technological, human, industrial and institutional elements illustrate the progression of the Italian space industry over the last two decades, a rise that also intersects with a global trend, that of the revaluation of space through the “new space” and the revival of exploration that has been observed generally since the 2010s
The evolution of programs
The Italian space sector is therefore at the confluence of internal and external trends that explain the growth dynamics that we have already observed concerning the budgets.
If we examine the programs, we notice that within the ministry, Italy defends already active threads, in particular the realization of the Vega E launcher (with a liquid propellant) as well as that of the space service shuttle Space Rider, without forgetting the development of a reusable upper stage
An important aspect is the long-term nature of Italian public orders, a factor that appears to be a real lever. From this point of view, one of the most remarkable aspects is certainly the growth in Earth observation capabilities, with the new Iride constellation in particular, financed by Italy under the European recovery plan
From this point of view, Iride intends to increase the availability of geo-observation information of the Italian national territory, with the objective of feeding the various Italian administrations in a dual perspective, but also to allow the development of services to deal with critical aspects of environmental management, for example with regard to the fine knowledge of land movements. It is a vision of a potential public and private market that underlies a project that will also increase the information production capacities for security users. Here again, this aspect is characteristic of an Italy that, since the production of the Cosmo-Skymed satellites, has always put forward a dual logic, that of civilian and military users, which allows it to mobilize resources that the Ministry of Defense alone would not be able to gather. It is also important to note the vision of an Italian ecosystem that wants to increase its capacity to produce space-based information in order to be upstream in the global data value chain. This priority given to Earth observation is also reflected in Italy’s constant support for the European Copernicus program, a strategic vision that is expressed in the appointment, in October 2021, of Simonetta Cheli as director of ESA’s Earth observation programs, which strengthens the proximity between ESRIN in Frascati and Italian institutions, as can be seen in the management of the Iride program.
Among the programs under development, it is important to highlight the investment in exploration. The Space Rider automated vehicle program is significant in this respect, especially since it includes a component on atmospheric re-entry. Finally, it is important to note how Italy contributes, through the specific capabilities of TAS-I’s Turin facilities, not only to the European part of the Artemis lunar program (within the MSE, the European service module for the Orion spacecraft) but also to the development of NASA lunar habitation modules for Northrop Grumman, not to mention the work on lunar orbit habitation structures. TAS-I is an important supplier in the context of the re-launch of lunar exploration, either through the ESA contribution or directly for NASA.
This duality appears to reveal underlying trends. The Italian space sector is characterized by national dynamics that must be constantly analyzed through their international correspondences. It has historically been built in a double dimension, transatlantic and European, and this matrix is found today in the main axes of cooperation (NASA, ESA and EU/Commission).
The relationship with France: collaboration and competition
The Italian space sector is also characterized by a very close relationship with France, which is articulated in several circles, from bilateral programs to European programs (ESA or European Commission). We have already mentioned the evolution of the industrial alliance between TAS and Telespazio, the “Space Alliance”, which appears to be a structuring factor. With regard to programs, we must emphasize the long-standing collaboration in military Earth observation, initiated by the Turin agreement signed in 2001 and which today takes the form of an agreement signed in 2019 between the French CSO program and the Italian Cosmo Skymed New Generation program. These agreements are based on exchanges of capabilities, which in some respects may appear to be a real limitation. For military telecommunications, the agreements between Athena Fidus and Sicral also structure a continuity of cooperation.
In 2015, a global cooperation protocol was signed between CNES and ASI, which allowed the programming of various initiatives. Bilateral relations have experienced ups and downs in recent periods, with a particularly negative phase in 2018-2019. The intergovernmental summit in Naples in February 2020 marked a return to normal, and the appointment of Mario Draghi as head of the Italian government in 2021 ushered in a period of remarkable cooperation with the Macron presidency. In November 2021, this resulted in a bilateral revival, with not only the signing of the Quirinal Treaty, whose Article 7 specifically describes the framework for space cooperation, but also, at the same time, the signing of a bilateral cooperation agreement on launchers, which lays the foundations for joint and reciprocal support for Ariane, a French priority, as well as Vega, an Italian priority, and settles issues of industrial load sharing between the two countries
It should also be noted on this point that the affirmation of Italian space sometimes feeds a thread of nationalist thought that claims a state of space “power” for Italy
The rise of the Italian space sector is certainly good news, as it illustrates the will of a country that relies on technology as part of its growth strategy, an operation that can only be beneficial because it is likely to have a ripple effect at the European level. But this affirmation of space is also sometimes interpreted in a nationalistic way in Italy, particularly with regard to the relationship with France, which is often entwined with rivalry.
The perception of this reality, which is often ambivalent, should push Europe to strengthen its cooperative game, with aspects of competition that can prove virtuous if they remain within the framework of a common vision of progress and solidarity.
