How Chinese and American companies are building satellites instead of cars

Asia Technonomics

In the weekly column we take turns writing about innovation and economic trends in Asia.

(Photo: Klawe Rzeczy)

Beijing A few years ago, when an employee of the Chinese car manufacturer Geely told me that the company wanted to launch its own satellites into space, I admittedly had to ask again. An automaker going into space? This was otherwise only known from Tesla founder Elon Musk. A few years later, this month, Geely’s subsidiary Geespace successfully launched nine satellites into low Earth orbit.

The Chinese carmaker developed and built the GeeSAT-1 missile itself. By 2025, the company, which also owns the Volvo brand, wants to launch another 63 satellites into orbit.

Geely has big plans: In the end, a network of 240 satellites should be created and help Geely’s autonomous vehicles with navigation. The satellites would provide “centimeter-accurate, precise positioning and connectivity support for use by the automotive brands in Geely Holding’s portfolio,” the company says. This should enable “real, safe autonomous driving”.

The Chinese automaker is not the first to launch its own space program. Tesla founder Musk started the companies SpaceX and Starlink several years ago.

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SpaceX builds spacecraft that launch satellites into space, and Starlink connects the satellites to form a network. Ultimately, a network of thousands of satellites will be created, to which autonomously operating vehicles will also be linked.

The Japanese car manufacturer Honda also announced last year that it would enter the business of launching small satellites. The first test rocket should be launched by 2030.

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On the one hand, developing their own rockets helps companies improve their self-driving cars. On the other hand, they also expect it to open up their own business area.

A traditional car manufacturer like Honda can draw on its experience with internal combustion engines in the construction and development of rocket engines. “Rocket combustion and guidance technologies and lower costs are already in the hands of automakers,” said Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe. “We will only change the area in which the technologies are applied.”

Compared to other countries, private space travel in China developed relatively late. The starting signal was given by document number 60 of the Chinese State Council, with which the Chinese government called on companies for the first time to invest private capital in the development of the national civil space infrastructure.

From 2015, a veritable boom in private space travel developed. There are now several hundred Chinese companies involved in the commercial space industry, including OK Space, which was founded in 2014 and is considered one of the first Chinese companies in the field. Others include iSpace, Galactic Energy and Landspace.

The Chinese analysis company iiMedia Research estimates that the domestic market for commercial aerospace is expected to exceed 1.5 trillion yuan (around 210 billion euros) in 2022 – and the trend is rising sharply.

In the Asia Techonomics column, Nicole Bastian, Dana Heide, Sabine Gusbeth, Martin Kölling and Mathias Peer take turns writing about innovation and economic trends in the most dynamic region in the world.

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