AROBS Engineering represents Romania in mission to remove debris from Earth’s orbit

AROBS Engineering, part of AROBS Transilvania Software, the largest technology company listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, represents Romania at the ClearSpace-1 consortium for a pioneering mission to remove debris from Earth’s orbit.

ClearSpace is an in-orbit services (IOS) company created in 2018 that intends to revolutionize how space missions are conducted. The company, based in Switzerland, and its industrial partners have recently passed their first significant program review with European Space Agency (ESA) for the mission.

In 2020, ESA commissioned ClearSpace to build, launch, and fly a novel deorbit mission to rendezvous with and capture a large piece of debris in orbit, then safely pilot the object into Earth’s atmosphere. This will be done through the ClearSpace-1 program supported by ESA and the participating states.

AROBS Engineering is one of the ClearSpace and the ESA industrial partners to deliver an embedded software solution for the ClearSpace-1 program.

“The selection of our company as a partner in the ClearSpace-1 program, following a competition in which AROBS Engineering was evaluated as the best in Romania in providing this type of embedded software services, validates our colleagues' high expertise in aerospace. I want to congratulate the AROBS Engineering team for this exceptional achievement. We are proud that they will be involved in a project with a significant impact on the future of the European aerospace industry,” said Voicu Oprean, founder and CEO of AROBS, in the press release.

ClearSpace has designed a four-armed capture system for its robotic satellite as a critical step in developing this unique debris-removal mission. This innovative technology successfully passed proof-of-concept testing at ESA’s research and technology center (ESTEC) in the Netherlands in October 2022. AROBS Engineering was responsible for a key part of the mission. The ClearSpace-1 program is planned to be launched in 2026.

This is the first collaboration between AROBS Engineering and ClearSpace and it is one of many collaborations supported by ESA.

AROBS Engineering (former Enea Software Services Development business line and team) provides premium embedded software development services to clients in Europe and North America—the company works with globally significant aerospace, medical, and maritime partners.

(Photo source: AROBS Engineering)