Fossa: The twenty-something who manufactures satellites within the middle of Madrid | Business | EUROtoday

On Madrid’s Gran Vía road there are usually not solely theaters, trend or memento outlets. There can also be the headquarters of Fossa, the corporate that Julián Fernández based 5 years in the past and which builds satellites that present connectivity providers in distant areas. Created when Fernández was 16 years previous, for which she needed to emancipate herself earlier than a notary, it was at this age when she launched her first satellite tv for pc, with the sponsorship of Everis Aeroespacial y Defensa, which value 30,000 euros.

With the Telecommunications Engineering diploma nonetheless unfinished, which he’s finding out on the Madrid Rey Juan Carlos University, he has a group of fifty staff, he had a turnover of 1 million euros in 2024, 500% greater than in 2023, and though it nonetheless doesn’t make earnings, he hopes to have them quickly. A bit of over a 12 months and a half in the past, it raised a financing spherical of 6.3 million euros that got here from a Japanese and a Portuguese fund. In addition, it has a capital improve underway for the next quantity. At the second it has two workplaces, one in Madrid and one other in Lisbon (Portugal), and its plans embody opening yet one more outdoors of Europe, however it doesn’t specify the placement.

The origin of this journey arose when Fernández was working independently and from residence on IoT tasks (connectivity of objects), “messing around on the Internet,” he smiles. He explains how in large cities all the pieces is simple, however he verified how in lots of areas, even in Spain, units which are related to the web can’t be deployed as a result of there isn’t any community. “The opportunity was in the satellites,” he says. Although, as he argues, they’re nothing new nor have Fossa invented them, he has redesigned and redefined their use to transform them into smaller, extra accessible and economical platforms. “When you think of a satellite, you think of Airbus, Boeing, Hispasat, years of work and enormous pieces, very heavy and worth hundreds of millions of euros.” Now on common these from Fossa weigh about six kilos; Assembling and launching them prices round half 1,000,000 euros and in six months they’re prepared for launch, which they do by way of the corporate SpaceX, from Cape Canaveral in Florida or from Vandenberg in California.

They have put 21 satellites into orbit, connecting tons of of 1000’s of units. They have a license to launch as much as 80, which could be in house concurrently. With a helpful life of 5 years, when it ends they disintegrate. “If a shooting star is ever seen in the sky, it could be a satellite reaching the atmosphere,” he explains. Its purchasers cowl different sectors similar to logistics, protection, agriculture, oil and maritime transport, and names similar to Microsoft or Exolum seem on its checklist. Its area of interest is within the so-called linear infrastructure: railways, highways, oil pipelines… “If I am covering a 4,000 kilometer high voltage line, the best way to connect and control it is via satellite. This avoids sending operators to remote areas to measure the voltage. We also control excavating machines in isolated areas.”

Double monitor

They develop two enterprise strains. On the one hand, the sale of satellites and, on the opposite, the connectivity service. “A logistics company is usually not interested in owning a satellite, they only want to monitor containers. The option we give them is to buy plans from five euros per month.” Fernández boasts of the worth that Fossa brings to its purchasers. He feedback that it’s the solely firm that verticalizes all know-how. “Hispasat, for example, does not manufacture its satellites, it buys them from other companies. We have sovereignty and control. This is now geopolitically very, very powerful, because if I have an antenna that is American and tomorrow the US turns it off or tells me that it is no longer selling it to me, I will be left out.”