Launching modules into orbit

05 February 2026

In the first instance, it seems incongruous to find the words “space travel” and “Slovakia” in the same sentence. And yet, Slovakia’s space industry has seen significant growth in recent years. The country is now pushing ahead with what is surely has to be its most ambitious space project yet: the development of a modular satellite platform that can be used for a wide variety of missions. Pavla Dohanyosova and her team from ALTER, a subsidiary of the TÜV NORD GROUP, are significantly involved in the Stephanik project.

And herein are to be found the advantages of this kind of modular system. Where current practice is to build a completely new satellite every time, it will be possible to reuse the modular building blocks for purposes such as propulsion and to easily and cheaply recombine them so that the satellite can be adapted to different purposes. This will save time and costs for development and production. Components will be replaceable or upgradable in orbit, extending the life of the satellite without generating more space debris. “Since each module can be procured, tested or updated independently, the satellite will also be less susceptible to delays in the supply chain,” explains Ms. Dohanyosova. If bottlenecks occur, it will be a simple matter to change suppliers and swap components for alternatives without delaying the planned launch.

With Stephanik, Slovakia aims to finally establish itself as a significant player in the growing space economy, which, according to EU estimates, is expected to achieve a volume of around 1.6 trillion euros worldwide by 2035. The project will generate pan-European experience in the construction of modular satellites and strengthen the independence in space travel of the EU as a whole, Ms. Dohanyosova says. This is of fundamental importance in times when the very basis of the transatlantic partnership is in question.

Sustainability is playing a key role in the Stephanik project, which is committed to the European Space Agency’s “Zero Debris Charter” and therefore aims to ensure that its satellites do not add to the problem of space debris in orbit. To achieve this goal and bring waste avoidance a step closer, Ms. Dohanyosova and her colleagues are having to think through various aspects of the project, ranging from the selection of the material and the launch vehicle to questions of how collisions in space can be prevented and the satellite steered out of orbit into the Earth’s atmosphere in a controlled manner at the end of its life to allow it to burn up harmlessly.

Ms. Dohanyosova and her ALTER team of around twenty experts from different disciplines are also providing support in the selection of test procedures and components to ensure that all parts of the modular satellite will be able to cope with the extreme conditions in space. These tests are a speciality of ALTER’s experts, who have already contributed their expertise to numerous ESA and NASA missions.