Industry Space Website [1] Founded 1978 Parent organization Telespazio | Key people Peter Young (CEO) Headquarters Luton, United Kingdom Number of employees 120 (2013) | |
Type Private (Subsidiary of Telespazio) Profiles | ||
Telespazio VEGA UK Ltd. is a British space company based in Luton, Bedfordshire. Founded in 1978 by a small group of engineers at the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt, Germany, VEGA now works with Space agencies, satellite operators and manufacturers around the world. It works with the European Space Agency (ESA) and ESOC in Germany, European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, ESA Centre for Earth Observation (ESRIN) in Rome, Italy, and European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC) in Madrid, Spain.
Since 1978, VEGA has worked on almost every ESA mission and many other European and international programmes, including Mars Express, the Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) for the International Space Station (ISS), the Eumetsat Polar System, and the Ground Segment Development for ADEN.
On 1 January 2011, VEGA Space Ltd, became a part of Telespazio, the Rome-based space systems services company. It was previously a part of Finmeccanica (now Leonardo, having been originally acquired in 2008 as VEGA Group PLC.
Telespazio VEGA is an active member of UKspace, the trade association for Britain’s space industry, and is heavily involved with the International Space Innovation Centre based in Harwell.
History
VEGA was established in 1978 by a small group of engineers at the European Space Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany, who bid for and won a contract to provide satellite operations support to ESA missions. Since then, VEGA has continued to provide support on the same contract, which has been re-tendered every five years. The company has grown and evolved significantly in the past 32 years, including the following milestones: