The Director General of the European Space Agency (ESA), Josef Aschbacher, has described PLD Space as “exceptional” after the technical meeting held at the Spanish company’s facilities. This is the first time Aschbacher has visited PLD Space’s headquarters in Elche (Spain), where the company’s co-founders, Raúl Torres and Raúl Verdú, along with its Executive President, Ezequiel Sánchez, updated him on its technological and business plans.
Moreover, for the first time the ESA Director General was able to see the MIURA 5 programme’s progress, as well as its new 12,500 m2 factory where this space launcher’s first subsystems are already being manufactured.
Aschbacher was accompanied by Toni Tolker-Nielsen, ESA’s Director of Space Transportation; and Juan Carlos Muñoz-Delgado, Head of ESAC EFM Service. The working meeting was also attended by the Director General of the Spanish Space Agency (AEE), Juan Carlos Cortés, and the director of AEE’s technical office, Ana Marín. The Spanish Minister for Science, Innovation and Universities, Diana Morant, also took part in the visit.
At one point during the tour, the ESA director general addressed the more than 220 people who currently make up the PLD Space team: “I am very impressed with what I have seen today. What you have achieved is outstanding,” he said. “This is what I wanted to see as ESA’s director general.”
“You transmit a lot of energy, this energy is of course what put MIURA 1 in space,” he stated. Aschbacher highlighted the milestone launch of PLD Space’s rocket on 7 October. “It is a success for you and for Europe.” He also underlined the company’s capability to deliver: “You have achieved everything you have promised, you do not use empty words, you deliver results based on a clear and honest plan. […] I have complete trust that you will go down this path. You are part of my future.”
Also addressing the team, Juan Carlos Cortés said that the Spanish Space Agency was “very happy to have capacity in Spain,” while Minister Diana Morant stressed that “the technology made in Spain by PLD Space has become a benchmark for ESA to achieve Europe’s strategic space autonomy.”
