Can the African Space Agency enable a commercial space market?
The inauguration of the African Space Agency (AfSA) on January 25, 2023 heralded a decades long push for a continental agency to direct space affairs within Africa. In this series, Kwaku Sumah examines the stated aims and goals of the agency, and asks, is it possible for the AfSA to achieve its stated aims as designed?
Read the previous Part One,
Read the next Part Three
“Privately held space companies are now the main drivers of innovation and progress in the [space] industry”
The overall space economy has been growing year on year and is composed of commercial space activities and government investments in space. Unlike the 20th century, where governments were the driving forces behind progress and innovation (e.g. the Apollo programme and the Global Positioning System), the private sector now dominates; accounting for ca. U.S.$ 337 billion or 91% of the global space economy in 2021.[1]
The emergence of the private spaceflight industry and miniaturised satellites has broken down traditional boundaries and legacy business models, leading to a rise of new entrants, and innovations in products, services and processes, which in turn, has created spill-over effects in industries inside and outside the space sector. The term NewSpace has come to signify this transformation of the industry, where technological innovations have led to business model transformation, and large reductions in costs. Decreasing costs for space hardware has attracted new entrants into this market, who leverage satellite technology and access to space to drive innovation and efficiency in their products and services. Space is ultimately used as a lever to expand a service’s reach to the global level, ensuring economy of scale benefits.
Privately held space companies are now the main drivers of innovation and progress in the industry, demonstrated plainly by firms like SpaceX who in the past few years have delivered reusable and self-landing launchers, and made history as the first private company to send humans to space. Virgin Galactic pioneered human spaceflight for private individuals, Planet provides daily satellite imagery using low-cost miniaturised satellites, and OneWeb is building capability to deliver global broadband satellite internet services.
In tandem with this, investments into the space industry and NewSpace firms has exploded. US$ 7,6 billion was invested in 124 start-ups in 2020, and of the U.S.$ 36,7 billion invested in start-ups between 2000 and 2020, 72% has been invested since 2015[2] – highlighting the change in industry structure.
The NewSpace revolution of the space industry relies heavily on small-satellites[3] (smallsats) which, due to Moore’s Law and advances in engineering, are able to provide high-powered data at a fraction of the cost of legacy satellites. In the present day, smallsats dominate the satellite market, with 94% of spacecraft launched as smallsats in 2021. Large constellations of smallsats are now in vogue, as 37% of all smallsats launched in past ten years were launched in 2020 to 2021 – largely driven by SpaceX’s Starlink and OneWeb’s constellations.[4]
These changes and innovations are largely driven by non-African economies, with the U.S. and China in particular having considerable influence in the development of these technologies and global supply chains.
In the midst of these innovations, the largest revenue drivers in the space industry remain satellite navigation and communications which account for 50% and 41% of the total market value respectively, driven by direct-to-consumer applications. EO still accounts for a marginal 5% of the total value but with a much higher proportion upstream.[5]
“Few African countries have a space programme or national agency, and even fewer hold the capability to manufacture, launch, or operate space assets”
Over the past two decades, the African space ecosystem has seen rapid growth. Initially driven by a few nations on the back of military programmes, the landscape has evolved to include several dedicated national space agencies across the continent; regional entities collaborating with foreign agencies on the use of space-derived geospatial data; nations launching their own space programmes and satellites; universities and research institutes with distinguished academics in disciplines relevant to space science and technology; as well as private space entities providing services both locally and globally.
African governments are increasingly seeing the potential of space services and applications and are allocating more funds to their space programmes at an increasing rate. 19 African countries have defined (or are in the midst of defining) national space programmes, and several are party to space treaties of the United Nations (15 in the Outer Space Treaty, and 14 in the Rescue Agreement).[6]
Overall though, few African countries have a space programme or national agency, and even fewer hold the capability to manufacture, launch, or operate space assets. The following table lists the nations with relevant space capabilities. 20 countries do not make the table, highlighting the size of the task going forward, and the difficulties that the AfSA will face in coordinating the African space arena – especially if it is meant to be solely in charge of coordinating the implementation of the African Space Policy and Strategy, as well as conducting activities to exploit space technologies on the continent.
An assessment of African space nation capabilities in 2022 [7]
Additionally, the growth of the African space ecosystem is taking place in an increasingly complex international context. Security concerns are growing in prominence, with unpredictable U.S., Chinese and Russian policies, and emerging actors in India and the Middle East all with, or pursuing, increased defence capabilities in space, highlighted by successful tests of anti-satellite weapons and systems (ASAT), and increased cyber-attacks. Over the past years, the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the crisis in supply chains[8], and commodity shortages.[9] With the current Ukraine crisis promising further food and commodity crunches, high inflation, and hostility in the geopolitical arena.
On the technological front, several disruptive innovations are occurring concurrently, including Artificial Intelligence, 5G and the Internet of Things (IoT), autonomous vehicles and robotics, quantum and blockchain technologies, as well advances in additive manufacturing. While these are separate technologies, it is becoming clearer that they work synergistically and will not thrive without space-based infrastructure.
“The AfSA as formulated appears to diminish the role of the private sector in favour of consolidating power to the AfSA”
This brings to the forefront questions surrounding Africa’s technological and economic dependence on foreign countries, highlighting the need for strategic autonomy, technology sovereignty and a unified front to counter foreign influences, and to protect continental economic security and competitiveness. The dual-use nature of space systems, and their role as a piece of critical infrastructure highlights the need for Africa to have a clear coherent strategy for space assets and infrastructure, ideally securing autonomy in this regard – to which the development of the African Space Policy and Strategy has provided some clarity. Additionally, as space is a global industry dominated by private sector activity, it is important for Africa to remain internationally competitive both in the upstream and downstream space sector. Yet, the AfSA as formulated appears to diminish the role of the private sector in favour of consolidating power to the AfSA – a legacy approach ill-suited to current realities.
The AfSA is expected to implement the African Space Policy and Strategy, which addresses the private sector nominally under Objective 3: Developing the regional market, and more specifically in the sub-objective of “promot[ing] public-private partnerships.”[10] However, the other sub-objectives listed, namely aiming to “develop a globally competitive African space programme … create an industrial capability … promote R&D-led industrial development [and] … use indigenous space technologies, products and services”[11] provide little insight as to the intended involvement of the private sector. In addition, the described AfSA functions see the AfSA taking on a large role in addressing the needs of the African market and developing products and services;[12] which in my view should be largely the remit of the private sector.
Looking at the growth of the African space economy in context of the global economy, the picture of the African space industry looks less impressive. The Middle East & Africa regions represent only 2% of the U.S.$ 37 billion upstream market, and 8% of the U.S.$ 300 billion downstream market.[13] These figures are especially stark considering Africa is the second most populous continent in the world, split into 54 states, representing 20% of the Earth's land surface area, and is projected to be the fastest growing region over the next 20 to 30 years.[14]
While Africa has launched 52 satellites by 14 countries since 1989, the majority have been launched by universities and national agencies, largely with the help of foreign entities (i.e. as part of the Japanese Birds-1 program, the JAXA[15] KiboCube program, or built by European or Chinese manufacturers).
Only four satellites operating in Africa have been launched by commercial entities thus far:
Nilesat 101, 102, 201, and 301 launched in 1998, 2000, 2010, and 2022 by Egyptian company Nilesat.
RASCOM-QAF 1 and 1R were launched in 2007 and 2010 by the Regional African Satellite Communication Organisation which represents 44 African telecommunication operators.
New Dawn (now Intelsat 28) launched by Convergence Partners with help from Orbital Sciences Corporation and Intelsat
The South African nSight1 was launched by SCS Space in 2017.
The Tunisian Challenge One was launched by the Telnet Group in 2021.
For an industry that is largely dominated by the private sector, and increasingly driven by private companies, ignoring the impact and potential for private companies to lead the African space industry is in my view misguided. The key issue with the AfSA as formulated, is that it does not account for the changed space landscape. Rather relying on a baseline model built on Europe and ESA which is not immediately applicable to the African context. Rather than assessing the African context and building a structure bottom-up, the design is mainly top-down, applying the wrong lessons from the European context to build an idealised continental governance structure, without considering the realities on the ground.
As pointed by Martinez, Aganaba-Jeanty, and others, a continental body is ill-suited to manage regional and local affairs effectively; and one that consolidates power at the cost of the private sector is even less suited for the current global space regime. The AfSA should rather reduce its scope and work towards enabling the commercial market on a continental level.
Part 3 of this series explores the benefits of a decentralised commercial space market.
Kwaku Sumah
Kwaku is the founder of Spacehubs Africa, and has been active in the space industry since 2016, working as a consultant for European and African space institutions and companies. He has worked on projects across the entire space value chain, including analysis on downstream markets, space debris evolution, planetary defence, and the launch market; as well as an assessment of the European financing landscape and due diligence on space companies.
[1] Euroconsult, “Space Economy Report 2021, 8th Edition”, December 2021.
[2] BryceTech, “Start-up Space 2021 – Update on Investment in Commercial Space Ventures”, August 2021.
[3] Smallsats defined as satellites < 600kg.
[4] BryceTech, “Smallsats by the Numbers 2022”, 7 February 2022.
[5] Euroconsult, “Space Economy Report 2021, 8th Edition”, December 2021.
[6]Nelly-helen Ebruka. “African States and International Space Treaties”, https://spacehubs.africa/insight/2020/7/african-states-and-international-space-treaties
[7] Author analysis. Last update 12/2022
[8] Rebeca Grynspan, “Here’s how we can resolve the global supply chain crisis”, 18 January 2022, https://unctad.org/news/heres-how-we-can-resolve-global-supply-chain-crisis
[9] Neil Hume and Emiko Terazono, “Waning stockpiles drive widespread global commodity crunch”, 13 February 2022, https://www.ft.com/content/d4766d00-75ee-4382-9373-f326c89630e1
[10] African Union, “African Space Policy, Towards Social, Political and Economic Integration. Second Ordinary Session for the Specialized Technical Committee Meeting on Education, Science and Technology”, 21 to 23 October 2017, Cairo, Egypt, https://au.int/sites/default/files/newsevents/workingdocuments/33178-wd-african_space_policy_-_st20444_e_original.pdf
[11] Ibid.
[12]African Union, “Draft Statute of the African Space Agency”, 11 October 2017, https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/36198-treaty-statute_african_space_agency_e.pdf
[13] Euroconsult, “Space Economy Report 2021, 8th Edition”, December 2021.
[14] UN, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Population Division, 2017.
[15] JAXA is the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency.