How Non-Space Companies Fuel the Space Economy

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The Hidden Network

When we think of the space industry, images of towering rockets, gleaming satellites, and astronauts in orbit often come to mind. The spotlight naturally falls on the marquee names – the government agencies like NASA and the European Space Agency, or the high-profile private companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin that build and launch vehicles into space. But behind these headline-grabbing operations lies a vast, intricate, and often invisible supply chain. This ecosystem is populated by companies whose names you might recognize from entirely different industries – automotive, software, chemicals, or consumer electronics.

These businesses aren’t “space companies” in the traditional sense. Their primary focus isn’t building rockets or operating satellites. Instead, they provide the essential tools, materials, components, and services that make space exploration and commerce possible. They are the modern equivalent of the merchants who sold picks, shovels, and denim trousers during the 19th-century gold rushes. While prospectors chased the dream of striking it rich, these suppliers built sustainable businesses by providing the gear everyone needed.

The reliance on this hidden network is a sign of the space economy’s maturation. As space activities move from purely government-led exploration to a diverse commercial marketplace, the industry can’t afford to reinvent every wheel. It leverages the expertise, scale, and proven reliability of established terrestrial industries. A company that has spent decades perfecting a high-strength metal alloy for jet engines or a super-reliable computer chip for industrial control systems is perfectly positioned to adapt its products for the rigors of space. This article explores the diverse sectors and specific companies that form this foundational, yet often overlooked, layer of the journey to the final frontier.

Advanced Materials and Manufacturing

Every object sent to space begins as a collection of raw and processed materials. The unique environment beyond Earth’s atmosphere – a vacuum with extreme temperature fluctuations and constant bombardment by radiation – places extraordinary demands on these materials. They must be incredibly strong yet lightweight, resistant to corrosion, and stable across a vast thermal range.

Metals and Alloys

The adage “every gram counts” is a guiding principle in spacecraft design. The heavier a rocket or satellite is, the more propellant is required to lift it out of Earth’s gravity well, which dramatically increases launch costs. This has driven a constant search for materials that offer the highest possible strength-to-weight ratio.

Companies specializing in metallurgy and advanced alloys are indispensable partners. ATI Inc., for example, is a major producer of specialty metals like titanium and nickel-based superalloys. While these materials are common in commercial aviation and defense for building jet engine components and airframes, their properties make them ideal for space. Rocket engine nozzles, high-pressure fuel lines, and structural components of spacecraft that must endure intense heat and stress are often made from these advanced alloys. ATI’s core business is not space, but its decades of metallurgical expertise directly support it.

Similarly, aluminum has long been a staple of aerospace construction. But the aluminum used in a rocket is far from the kind found in a soda can. Constellium, a global leader in aluminum products, manufactures high-performance alloys, including Aluminium–lithium alloys. These materials are lighter and stronger than conventional aluminum alloys. They were famously used in the massive external fuel tank of the Space Shuttleand continue to be used in the main stages of launch vehicles like the European Ariane rockets, helping to reduce structural weight and maximize payload capacity.

Composites and Polymers

Beyond metals, composite materials have become fundamental to modern spacecraft construction. Carbon fiber reinforced polymers (CFRPs) offer remarkable strength and stiffness at a fraction of the weight of metals. Toray Industries, a Japanese chemical company, is one of the world’s largest producers of carbon fiber. While its materials are used extensively in everything from Formula 1 race cars to the fuselages of modern airliners like the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, this same technology is vital for space. Rocket payload fairings – the nose cone that protects a satellite during ascent – are often made from carbon fiber composites to keep them light yet rigid. Satellite buses, the main body or chassis that holds all the components, also rely heavily on composites to save weight.

Another key supplier is DuPont, a company synonymous with material science innovation. Two of its inventions, Kapton and Kevlar, are ubiquitous in space. Kapton is a polyimide film with an incredible ability to remain stable across a temperature range from -269 to +400 degrees Celsius (-452 to +752 degrees Fahrenheit). This makes it the default material for the multi-layer insulation (MLI) blankets that swaddle satellites and spacecraft, protecting their sensitive electronics from the intense heat of direct sunlight and the extreme cold of shadow. Kevlar, famous for its use in bulletproof vests, is also used in space for its high strength and low weight, sometimes as a protective layer against micrometeoroid impacts or for reinforcing pressure vessels.

Additive Manufacturing (3D Printing)

Additive manufacturing, commonly known as 3D printing, is shifting how space hardware is designed and built. It allows engineers to create incredibly complex, single-piece components that were previously impossible to make with traditional machining. This process can drastically reduce weight, consolidate multiple parts into one, and slash production times.

Companies that pioneered 3D printing technology for terrestrial applications are now key players in the space sector. 3D Systems, which invented the original stereolithography (SLA) process, now offers a range of printing technologies, including direct metal printing. Space companies use these systems to manufacture everything from lightweight brackets and fixtures to intricate rocket engine components like injector heads.

Another prominent example is Velo3D, which specializes in advanced metal 3D printing systems designed for high-performance applications. While their customers are in the aerospace and energy sectors, their business is selling the printing machines themselves. Their technology has been adopted by new-space companies to print complex rocket engine parts, demonstrating how a non-space manufacturing technology provider can become an essential enabler for the industry.

Software, Simulation, and Design

Before a single piece of metal is cut or a component is assembled, a spacecraft exists as a collection of data. It is designed, analyzed, simulated, and tested countless times in a digital environment. The software that makes this possible comes from companies that serve a broad swath of the global engineering and manufacturing economy.

Computer-Aided Design and Engineering

Modern rockets and satellites contain hundreds of thousands of individual parts that must fit together with perfect precision. Computer-Aided Design (CAD) software is the digital drawing board where these complex systems are created. Dassault Systèmes, a French software corporation, develops the CATIA and SOLIDWORKS software platforms. These are industry standards used to design everything from cars to consumer goods, but their powerful capabilities for handling complex assemblies and advanced surfacing make them essential for aerospace engineers laying out the intricate architecture of a launch vehicle or a satellite.

Similarly, software from Autodesk is a staple in design and manufacturing. While many know the company for its architectural software or AutoCAD, its advanced products like Inventor and Fusion 360 provide a complete toolchain for digital prototyping, enabling engineers to design, simulate, and plan the manufacturing process for space-bound components within a single software environment.

Simulation and Analysis Software

Building and testing physical prototypes of space hardware is incredibly expensive and time-consuming. This is where Computer-Aided Engineering (CAE) and simulation software become invaluable. These tools allow engineers to subject their digital designs to the harsh conditions of a rocket launch and the space environment without ever leaving their desks.

Ansys is a dominant force in this field. Its suite of multiphysics simulation software can model virtually every force a spacecraft will encounter. Engineers use Ansys to perform structural analysis to see if a satellite frame can withstand the violent vibrations of launch, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to optimize the flow of propellant through an engine, and thermal analysis to ensure components don’t overheat in the sun or freeze in the dark.

The industrial giant Siemens also plays a large role through its Digital Industries Software division. They provide a comprehensive portfolio of Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) software, which helps manage a product from initial concept through design, manufacturing, and operational life. Their simulation tools are used across the aerospace industry to test electronics, mechanics, and system performance long before hardware is built.

Embedded Systems and Operating Systems

The onboard computers that control rockets and satellites require highly specialized software. Unlike a personal computer that can be rebooted if it crashes, the software on a spacecraft must operate flawlessly for years in an environment where it can’t be physically accessed. This requires a real-time operating system (RTOS), which is designed for reliability and deterministic performance.

Wind River is a company that has established a commanding presence in this niche. Its VxWorks RTOS is a hardened, certified operating system used in countless embedded systems where failure is not an option, from industrial robotics and medical devices to networking gear. Its unmatched record of reliability has made it the go-to choice for space missions. VxWorks has served as the digital brain for every NASA Mars rover since 1997, including Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, Curiosity, and Perseverance. It also runs on the James Webb Space Telescope and the Juno spacecraft orbiting Jupiter. Wind River’s primary business isn’t space, but its software is one of the most widely traveled in the solar system.

Electronics and Components

A modern satellite is essentially a flying supercomputer, packed with processors, sensors, and communication systems. The electronics used must not only be powerful but also resilient enough to survive the journey to orbit and the punishing environment of space, particularly the constant threat of radiation.

Processors and Semiconductors

Earth is protected from the worst of solar and cosmic radiation by its magnetic field and atmosphere. In space, this protection is gone. High-energy particles can zip through a spacecraft, striking a standard microprocessor and causing a bit to flip in memory, which can corrupt data, crash software, or even permanently damage the chip. To prevent this, space missions rely on radiation-hardened, or “rad-hard,” electronics.

While some specialized companies focus solely on this, larger defense and industrial contractors often have divisions that produce these components. BAE Systems, a British defense and aerospace giant, is a leading producer of rad-hard processors. Its RAD750 PowerPC processor, a radiation-hardened version of a commercial chip, has been the workhorse of American space exploration for nearly two decades, powering over 100 different satellites and probes, including the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and the Kepler space telescope. The business of BAE Systems is overwhelmingly defense, but its specialized electronics capability makes it a key supplier to NASA and other space organizations. Similarly, the industrial conglomerate Honeywell has a large aerospace division that produces a wide array of avionics, from guidance systems to reaction wheels, many of which are hardened for space applications.

Sensors and Imaging

Much of the value generated from space comes from data collected by sophisticated sensors. Earth observation satellites use high-resolution imagers, weather satellites use radiometers, and space telescopes use exquisitely sensitive detectors to capture faint light from distant galaxies. The technology behind these sensors often originates in companies not exclusively focused on space.

Teledyne Technologies is a prime example. It is an industrial conglomerate that owns a portfolio of companies specializing in digital imaging. Their advanced charge-coupled device (CCD) and complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensors are considered the gold standard for high-performance scientific imaging. Teledyne sensors are the “eyes” of legendary instruments like the Hubble Space Telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope. They are also used in countless planetary science missions and commercial Earth-imaging satellites. While Teledyne has a significant space and defense business, its underlying expertise in sensor technology serves a much broader market.

Even consumer electronics giants can play a role. Sony is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of image sensors for digital cameras and smartphones. The company’s relentless innovation in this mass market has produced sensors with incredible sensitivity and low noise, qualities that are also highly desirable for certain scientific and commercial space applications. Specialized instrument builders often adapt these high-end commercial sensors for use in space.

Connectors and Cabling

A less glamorous but absolutely vital category is the vast web of connectors, wires, and cables that carry power and data throughout a spacecraft. A single loose connection can disable a billion-dollar satellite. These components must be incredibly reliable, able to withstand the vibrations of launch and operate for decades without maintenance.

TE Connectivity is a global industrial technology leader that manufactures an enormous range of connectors, sensors, and wires for harsh environments. Their products are used in cars, industrial machinery, subsea vehicles, and commercial aircraft. This expertise in creating highly reliable interconnects for demanding terrestrial applications translates directly to the needs of the space industry. The same engineering principles that ensure a connector in a jet engine works flawlessly for thousands of flight hours are applied to create components for satellites and launch vehicles.

Industrial Gases and Precision Cleaning

The space industry also relies on some of the most fundamental products of the industrial economy: gases. The process of manufacturing and launching rockets involves massive quantities of gases for everything from propellants to pressurization.

Propellant and Pressurant Gases

Many modern rockets, like SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and the Space Launch System, use liquid oxygen (LOX) as an oxidizer and a refined kerosene or liquid hydrogen (LH2) as fuel. These are not exotic chemicals; they are cryogenic industrial gases produced on a massive scale. Global industrial gas giants like Linde plc and Air Products are the ones who supply the enormous quantities of LOX, LH2, nitrogen, and helium needed at spaceports.

These companies operate air separation plants and hydrogen liquefaction facilities around the world to serve industrial customers in steel manufacturing, healthcare, and food processing. Launch providers are another type of customer for these bulk products. Helium and nitrogen are also used extensively on the ground and on the rocket as pressurant gases, pushing propellants into the engines, and for purging lines to remove contaminants. Without the massive industrial scale of these gas suppliers, every launch provider would have to build their own costly production infrastructure.

Precision Cleaning

The hardware used in space, particularly anything that comes into contact with highly reactive substances like liquid oxygen, must be cleaned to an almost unbelievable standard. A microscopic particle of hydrocarbon – a speck of oil or grease – can trigger a catastrophic explosion when exposed to pure oxygen under pressure. This requires a process called precision cleaning.

While there are specialized firms, the principles and chemicals used often come from companies that serve other industries requiring high levels of purity, such as semiconductor manufacturing or medical device production. A company like Ecolab, a global leader in water, hygiene, and energy technologies, develops advanced cleaning agents and processes for a wide range of industries. The knowledge of chemistry and material science required to ensure a medical implant is sterile or a silicon wafer is contaminant-free is directly applicable to cleaning rocket components.

Ground Systems and Infrastructure

A space mission’s success depends as much on the ground as it does on the hardware in orbit. A global network of antennas, data centers, and test equipment is needed to communicate with spacecraft, process the data they send back, and ensure they work correctly before they ever leave Earth.

Telecommunications and Data Handling

Satellites generate enormous volumes of data. A constellation of Earth-imaging satellites can produce terabytes of information every day. Getting this data to the ground and into the hands of users requires a global network of ground stations with large antennas. Traditionally, a satellite operator had to build or lease its own dedicated antennas, which was a major expense.

This is changing thanks to cloud computing providers. Amazon Web Services (AWS), the cloud computing arm of Amazon, now offers a service called AWS Ground Station. This allows satellite operators to rent antenna time on a pay-as-you-go basis, downloading their data directly into the AWS cloud for immediate processing and distribution. Microsoft‘s cloud platform, Azure, offers a similar service called Azure Space. These tech giants aren’t becoming satellite operators; they are leveraging their existing global infrastructure of data centers and fiber networks to sell a new service to the space industry, dramatically lowering the barrier to entry for new satellite companies.

Test and Measurement Equipment

Before launch, every electronic component and system on a spacecraft is subjected to rigorous testing to simulate the conditions of launch and life in orbit. This requires highly specialized electronic test and measurement equipment.

Keysight Technologies, which began as part of Hewlett-Packard, is a premier manufacturer of this equipment. Their oscilloscopes, network analyzers, and signal generators are essential tools in the labs of any company building satellite communication payloads or rocket avionics. National Instruments (now NI) provides modular hardware and software platforms that allow engineers to create custom automated test systems. These platforms are used to build the complex test rigs that verify the performance of everything from individual computer chips to fully assembled satellites. The primary markets for these companies are telecommunications, consumer electronics, and automotive, but their tools are indispensable for ensuring space systems are ready for their mission.

Summary

The space economy is a complex and deeply interconnected ecosystem. While the companies launching rockets and building satellite constellations capture the public imagination, they stand on the shoulders of a much broader industrial base. From the specialty metals in a rocket nozzle to the software that designs its flight path, and from the industrial gases that fuel its ascent to the cloud platforms that process its data, the contributions of non-space companies are everywhere.

This hidden network of suppliers allows the space industry to leverage decades of innovation and investment from other sectors. It enables space companies to focus on their core competencies without having to become experts in metallurgy, software development, or chemical production. As commercial activity in space continues to expand, the demand for these foundational products and services will only grow, further weaving the final frontier into the fabric of the global economy. The “picks and shovels” providers may not be the ones planting flags on other worlds, but they are the ones making the journey possible.

Last update on 2026-01-09 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API