Many start-ups want to go into orbit with their rockets and satellites, but this one wants to go further: The Bremen-based company Levity wants to build a uniform satellite platform with which customers can transport cargo to the moon: for example, scientific experiments, prototypes or even components for example for a communication network on the earth’s satellite. Aerospace engineers Lars Kesseler, 30, and Andres Lüdeke, 29, only registered the start-up with the Bremen District Court last July. The idea came up with beer a few years ago: “There is so much potential, let’s do something in space travel,” they decided.
“At that time it was already moving in the direction that small satellites in particular made it possible for universities, institutes and start-ups to think about doing space travel in the first place,” says Kesseler, who studied together with Lüdeke at the Aachen University of Applied Sciences. They developed the idea of a platform for lunar orbit, received funding from the state of North Rhine-Westphalia and moved into a start-up center of the Esa space agency in Bremen.
The founders would like to offer their lunar platform, which is about the size of a washing machine and weighs 150 kilograms, as flexible and inexpensive as possible, as project manager Niklas Kuchenbäcker, 25, explains – “with components available on the market that are already certified for space suitability “. Levity wants to build a satellite platform that customers can use for a wide variety of missions and which can hold up to 50 kilograms. “We want to enable smaller institutes and companies to use an off-shelf platform that can be flown in a short time,” says Kuchenbäcker. Production like on an assembly line should reduce costs. So far, customers have only been able to order tailor-made satellites, which is associated with a long development time and high costs.
A new one shows that the business idea is not as absurd as it might sound analysis of the consulting company PwC on market opportunities around the moon that can arise through research, settlement and exploitation of the earth’s satellite. Accordingly, the consultants expect a conservatively estimated global market of 55 billion dollars for the transport of goods alone in the next two decades, and with optimistic scenarios even almost double that.
The Levity founders also want to benefit from this. You can imagine assembling the satellites yourself in Bremen first. “We want to see that we start in Europe and use the optimism that is currently emerging,” says Kesseler. Outsourcing production in order to save a few cents per screw is out of the question for him. The team is now planning the first demo flight with just under ten people for 2026, they estimate that their product will then be launched on the market at exactly the right time in the course of the moon missions planned by many countries around the world. “We will then be a New Space forwarding company to the moon, with small satellites,” says Kesseler.
Landing on the moon is not yet planned
The satellite platform is to be brought into orbit with a microlauncher. Although this takes time, it is cheaper than with a large rocket, which would allow a faster moon flight. The business model does not yet envisage even landing on the moon. On the other hand, Levity also advertises customers who “only” want to fly their payloads in geostationary earth orbit, around 35,800 kilometers away, where so far mainly large, expensive satellites have been traveling. For comparison: the ISS space station is located at an altitude of 400 kilometers. “Our vision is to enable companies to benefit from New Space and to get into space quickly and also to develop new business areas that were previously unimaginable,” says Kuchenbäcker.
According to current estimates, the satellite and platform as well as take-off and flight are expected to cost around ten million euros. “According to NASA calculations, a similar satellite based on conventional, tailor-made construction costs twice as much,” says Kuchenbäcker. So far, the Bremen-based company has not encountered much competition, it is still in a niche area. Kesseler expects investments of around 15 million euros up to the premiere flight, the start alone will cost around five million euros. There are talks with venture capitalists about financing. A first round of financing is planned for the coming year. “Now it’s about building the first prototype.”