Changes and challenges in LSE

The SSC company LSE has acquired the Dutch company Aurora Technology which provides space science and engineering services to ESA in the Netherlands and Spain. The acquisition strengthens LSE’s team in Holland and extends the company’s presence to Spain. The additional skills coming from Aurora will benefit LSE’s activities in Germany and the Middle East.

Today, LSE is a team of 150 engineers and scientists. The company has continually expanded since its founding in 1990 to become a multi-national team providing a wide range of space services. In order to support this continuous growth, the management team was recently restructured and reinforced. The LSE Board of Directors is now Mr Tony Lancaster, Chairman, Mr Daniel Gestal, also remaining the Site Manager for ESOC, and Mr Zoubair Kachri, also managing External Projects and Business Development.

LSE recently played a key role in the preparation of ESA’s CryoSat II Earth Exploration satellite mission by leading the 6-months simulation campaign and providing training to the Mission Control Team at ESA’s operations center.

Having provided support to the German Armed Forces’ own communication system for several years, LSE now provides 24/7 spacecraft operations for both its satellites, one of which (COMSATBw-2) was launched in May. LSE is also in charge of the 24/7 Ground Station Operations at DLR’s SATCOMBw ground station in Weilheim and operations engineering services at the German Space Operations Center (GSOC).

The COMSATBw-2 launch also engaged SSC’s satellite
stations in Australia and Hawaii, as they supported
the Launch and Early Orbit Phase.