Applying Irish communications expertise in space

As the space industry matures and more organisations get involved – particularly privately funded entities – the potential applications grow. Communication between satellites, and from space to Earth, takes on an even greater importance. Here again, Ireland’s heritage in Earth-bound communication technology has become an advantage in space.

“Historically in Ireland, we had companies like Motorola in Cork, Ericsson in Athlone and Altobridge in Kerry – their cellular background is absolutely applicable to the satellite industry because of the overlap in areas like 5G non-terrestrial networks (NTN). So in Ireland there’s a lot of extremely good talent. They have the skills to understand telecoms, working to standards and how these systems are put together. We definitely have the skillset,” says Tim Moriarty, director within the global architecture team at ST Engineering iDirect.

Based in Killarney, county Kerry, ST Engineering iDirect (Ireland) established its presence in Ireland after it acquired intellectual property from locally based Altobridge. Its team of specialists, software developers, system architects, test engineers are experts in 3G, 4G and 5G and this happens to dovetail with recent trends in the space sector. 

“The majority of the team are working on integration of satellite and cellular communications in 5G technologies and architectures for NTNs. There’s a trend in the industry for more standardisation and use of 5G architectures,” Moriarty explains.

ST Engineering works with satellite operators in the maritime and aeronautical industries, governments, and also works on projects for the ESA and the European Commission. Recent funded initiatives involved satellite and 5G integration as well as cyber resilience in satcoms – projects that involved collaboration of 20 organisations across 12 EU nations.

A shift from proprietary tech to standards

“Traditionally, satellite systems used proprietary protocols and hardware, installations were a closed shop. Now as satellite-ground infrastructure providers, we’re capitalising on everything moving to the cloud and becoming more standards-based.” 

In time, this will enable satellites to move beyond traditional satcom terminals to hybrid terminals and, ultimately, to communicate directly with a smartphone, tablet or other user device, bringing cutting-edge developments to the satellite communications industry. “We’re in the lucky position in the Killarney office that we’re considered a centre of excellence with 5G expertise and the satellite systems knowledge – we’re at the confluence of those two things. It’s a very exciting space to work with some real engineering challenges,” he adds.

Working on an ESA project in 2019 allowed MBRYONICS to develop core photonics technologies in-house, which was an important precursor to winning a landmark deal with the US Government agency DARPA, to enable satellites in low Earth orbit to communicate with each other using cutting-edge silicon photonics.

The opportunity came about at the time through Intel’s Irish operation which wanted to bid on a project, and made the initial introductions to DARPA in the US. “DARPA had never heard of us. They were blown away by what we were working on,” says Mackey. “It’s Irish technology enabling the internet in space and we’re absolutely proud of it. Between Intel Ireland, now Altera Ireland, a wholly owned Intel subsidiary, and MBRYONICS, it’s a full end-to-end Irish solution.” 

Irish lasers on multiple satellites

MBRYONICS is in the process of establishing its pilot production facility in Galway, which will serve as a precursor to a large-scale manufacturing site set to be located in the west of Ireland, capable of producing thousands of units annually. “This is MBRYONICS  2.0: the industrialisation of getting our lasers onto as many satellites as possible,” Mackey says.

Irish companies are good partners for space projects because they’re problem solvers by nature, adds Michael Martin, CTO with Réaltra Space Systems Engineering. Réaltra straddles two worlds: producing spacecraft hardware suitable for low earth orbit using commercially available off-the-shelf components more quickly and at a lower cost than if it was developed from scratch. At the same time, it’s also capable of building mission-critical systems for highly specific applications in space.

Few companies can say they have an astronaut on the payroll, but Réaltra can. Dr Norah Patten is set to become the first Irish woman in space next year, and her knowledge of space flight testing has been invaluable, says Martin.

Dr Patten is part of a 25-strong team that has amassed an impressive list of achievements since it was founded just seven years ago. In 2023, it signed a €1 million contract with ArianeGroup to provide the next generation of European rocket launchers with important telemetry hardware.

“ArianeGroup wanted a video system for their new Ariane 6 launcher. With the support of Enterprise Ireland, we got that contract and the brief was: reduce the cost by 50%, reduce the time by 50%, and use as much off-the-shelf modern electronics as possible. And we achieved that,” says Martin.

A key part in the most expensive satellite ever

As a result of that success, ArianeGroup approached Réaltra a year and a half before the launch of the James Webb telescope, to adapt that video system to fly on the ArianeGroup 5 launcher carrying the telescope. NASA had originally mandated a very mature, stable rocket. “Then all of a sudden, ArianeGroup came to NASA and said: ‘we want to put a small Irish startup company’s video system a couple of metres away from the most expensive satellite ever launched’. So you can imagine the reaction of NASA to that,” Martin recalls. 

“We had to jump through an awful lot of hoops with the ESA and NASA and ArianeGroup to prove that the Réaltra system was safe to fly, wouldn’t damage the James Webb telescope, and would meet the requirements they had. And thankfully, we got through all of that successfully.”

The iconic images of the James Webb telescope deploying on Christmas Day 2021 was the first full high definition video transmission from space. “For a small Irish company to do that, changed everything,” Martin says.  

Réaltra is now on the supplier list for Boeing and is positioned to work with other launcher companies. According to Martin, it’s helped by providing a complete turnkey avionics system. “For the ArianeGroup rocket, all they have to do is drill some mechanical holes, and they give us one line to switch it on and off, and we do the rest.”

Single supplier advantage

This means customers like ArianeGroup deal with one company for a key component, instead of managing the complexity of multiple suppliers and interfaces between their systems. “Larger companies’ expertise is in engines and structures. We can say: we’ll look after the avionics system for you, we can put in what you want and configure it whatever way you want. So we’ve developed a suite of products that can be a full turnkey system, or we can supply separate subsystems that are small, light and low cost.”

Martin believes Réaltra’s size works in its favour. For one project, it developed a new camera to be placed inside a tank cooled at minus 250 degrees centigrade. “We had the first prototype built and tested before the client even had the project name signed off internally,” he says. “We’re seeing bigger companies coming to smaller, slim, agile SMEs to provide innovation for them.”

The reason for scaling is the estimated 60-80,000 satellites due to be launched over the next five to seven years, Mackey adds. That’s a combination of Government and commercial launches for applications like Earth observation to satellite broadband and the emerging area of communicating directly with phones and devices.

Optical telecommunications has taken off as a key area for space activity, because satellites need a way to communicate with each other and back to ground, wirelessly and with high bandwidth, for uses ranging from communications to sensing and earth observation. Pilot Photonics, a spinout of Dublin City University, has already had four contracts with the ESA, ranging from space science to telecommunications, and is about to embark on a fifth.

Partnerships key to Ireland’s space story

Partnerships are a key element in Ireland’s space sector, and Pilot Photonics is an example of this in practice. It has working relationships with many organisations in Ireland, from multinationals to local start-ups and the academic sector. Cadence Design Systems, which operates a global R&D centre in Cork, designs high-speed silicon chips but doesn’t have the in-house photonics expertise needed for future scaling. “They’re looking to companies like ours to integrate that into their roadmap,” explains Frank Smyth, CTO and co-founder of Pilot Photonics.

From a research and academic collaboration perspective, Pilot Photonics is engaged with many Irish universities. “We have ongoing collaborations that we fund through Science Foundation Ireland with Tyndall National Institute, MTU and DCU and Trinity: four different projects focused on photonics and RF… that’s a clear part of the ecosystem that we benefit from. And we have a collaboration with MBRYONICS, who are even more space focused than we are: we have relevant technology overlap with them and we’ve had a few proposals together. There is a nice ecosystem in Ireland from a space perspective,” says Smyth.

Like many Irish companies working in this field, Pilot Photonics can call on a roster of highly skilled staff: 50% of its team have PhDs.

In February 2025, the company attended Paris Space Week for the first time, exhibiting as part of the Irish Pavilion, and it won the PSW Innovation Challenge after giving a presentation on its Agile Optical Frequency Generator to a panel of judges.

Smyth points out that Pilot Photonics’ primary market is the telecoms and data centre but it’s always been very active in the space industry. For example, it has delivered technology to Airbus Defence and Space for its next-generation satellite payloads. 

Mature technology vital for space breakthrough

“The space market is too far out when you’re young with new technology and new innovations. A technology needs to be very mature and very advanced and very well qualified before you can turn it into revenue in the space market. Without early-stage funding from the ESA, there would be no way to properly go after the space market,” Smyth says. 

Adds John Mackey: “To get a foot in the door of the US space market is a major accomplishment. You typically have to be the size of a company like Airbus. While Ireland’s space sector is rapidly growing, 10 years ago we were an early player. We were able to leverage the significant history and heritage in photonics at Tyndall and the applied optics group in Galway.”

IDA Ireland is encouraging its client base to get more involved in space-related projects. It is in the early stages of discussions with multinationals that, for example, can integrate AI with high volumes of data gathered from satellites in low earth orbit. “This is a new growth market. There are opportunities for the foreign direct investment companies to grow and support that and build on the capacity we have in Ireland,” says IDA Ireland’s Tristan McCallum.

“That is changing the game and now we’re seeing more companies develop and grow and our agency is there to help them. We see an opportunity to leverage the existing capability in Ireland to help companies that are active or interested in becoming active, in a way that mirrors the potential that we are now seeing. The potential growth in the new space sector is significant and increasingly it’s of strategic importance,” McCallum says.

ESA’s Conor Sheehan adds: “The space sector is growing rapidly, and we’re focused on forging partnerships between Irish SMEs and multinationals. Ireland has a strong vanguard of companies whose proven capabilities are opening new doors – both for themselves and for others following in their path. Some projects are still in development, but the opportunities are exciting, and they’re only possible through collaboration.”

This article first appeared on IDA Ireland.