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Prime Minister Anthony Albanese unveiled the country’s first sovereign-made orbital launch vehicle during a visit to Gilmour Space’s Gold Coast facility.
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Dubbed the Eris, the vehicle is the first rocket that uses both solid and liquid propellants.
Gilmour Space hopes that the launch of Eris will take place later in the year.
“This is a great Australian success story. A company that began eight years ago but now employs 200 people here at the cutting edge of innovation, science, new technologies, and new jobs,” PM Albanese said.
“When this rocket goes into space, it will carry 300 companies with it. Australia will become the 12th country in the world to be able to have access to this technology — designed, manufactured and built right here (on the Gold Coast) and creating high quality jobs.
“This is one of the companies that we’re looking at when we have our National Reconstruction Fund and that whole agenda about a future here made in Australia — making use of an Australian procurement policy to buy Australian and making sure we back Australian science and innovation.
“Australia can compete with the rest of the world. What we need to do is to back our businesses that are doing it. This is truly an Australian manufacturing success story, and we want more of them.”
Adam Gilmour, chief executive officer of Gilmour Space, called for Australia to develop a sovereign launch and satellite capability.
“The team is working hard toward the first test launch of our Eris rocket later this year from the Bowen Orbital Spaceport in north Queensland. Only 11 nations have launched their own rockets into orbit, and our efforts will help to build a significant dual-use capability for Australia,” he said.
The announcement follows a recent agreement between Gilmour and US-based Atomos.
In February, Gilmour Space signed a memorandum of understanding to explore a multi-year contract for Gilmour and Atomos to mutually purchase services for launch and in-space transportation.
The partnership will see Atomos contract Gilmour for launch services on its Eris and upcoming orbital launch vehicles — in addition, Atomos’ orbital transfer vehicles (OTVs) will provide in-space transportation services to customers and launch aggregation services of multiple customer spacecraft for launch on Gilmour vehicles.
