Last week, at the 43rd ESA antenna workshop, Jeremy Perrin, CEO of Connektica, participated in a roundtable with Nicolas CAPET (CEO, Anywaves), and Fabien Ferrero (Founder, Orb Instruments).
Moderated by Elena Saenz, they discussed how to scale space components manufacturing. Especially , Design for Manufacturing & AIT, Digitalization and Automation. Below are the key takeaways.
1️⃣ 𝐈𝐭 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐧
– Accept “slightly lower peak performance” if it unlocks faster, more consistent AIT at scale.
– Build with assembly/debug in mind (Poka-Yoke mindset)
– Borrow rules from automotive/aviation.
2️⃣ 𝐃𝐢𝐠𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐳𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐢𝐬 𝐚 𝐦𝐮𝐬𝐭-𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐍𝐞𝐰𝐒𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐞
With New Space, you need
– To run root-cause across 10s–100s of units → You can’t spend hours hunting through paper, emails, and spreadsheets.
– Engineers focused on insights and fixes → You can’t afford them babysitting test setups or being tied to the shop floor.
– You need cost + reliability at speed → You can’t get there with manual processes and disconnected systems.
3️⃣ 𝐑𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐝𝐞𝐩𝐥𝐨𝐲𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭
– Start early: during prototyping/qualification to capture all the engineering know-how so that the 1st batch are produced faster and more reliably
– Phased approach: Digitize → pinpoint bottlenecks → automate → integrate production software together (MES – PLM – ERP)
To learn more about scaling space manufacturing and Connektica, download our complementary eBook, Aerospace Production Scaling – Evaluation Checklist and contact our experts if you have any questions.
