00:00How can Europe catch up in the space race?
00:10To do this, the European space sector will have to work hard to remain competitive with
00:15the U.S.
00:16In his inaugural address, U.S. President Donald Trump called for the U.S. to pursue its destiny
00:24into the stars and to plant the U.S. flag on Mars.
00:29The EU Commissioner for Defense and Space shared some of his ideas on Tuesday at the
00:34European Space Conference in Brussels.
00:41We are really very good in services like positioning with Galileo, we are very good in space observation
00:49with Copernicus, we shall be very good with satellite space communication, Iris Square.
00:59But we need to catch up with access to space and that is where we shall spend a lot of
01:08efforts really.
01:11The European space sector needs several elements to be competitive, according to the Director
01:16General of the European Space Agency.
01:18Talent, which Europe already has, public and private investments, and finally more speed
01:26and more simplicity.
01:28For the European Space Agency, Europe must build on its flagship programs, but also develop
01:33new projects.
01:35Should the continent be inspired by the collaboration in the U.S. between NASA and SpaceX of Elon
01:40Musk?
01:41We have decided that we want to be an anchor customer of major infrastructure in the future.
01:49For example, on new launchers, on new cargo return vehicles, where we will not develop
01:55the launcher from beginning to the end, but we will buy a launch service.
01:59We are launching the European Launcher Challenge actually this year, and to create new launcher
02:04companies that are at the beginning launching small satellites, that's exactly the same
02:09model that NASA applied to develop Falcon 9.
02:14The U.S. is the leading space power.
02:17It accounts for two-thirds of global investment in space.
02:21Europe is the third largest investor and accounts for 11% of the global space budget.
02:27In this race to the stars, the European Commissioner for Defense in Space and the European Space
02:32Agency hope that new funds will be allocated to the space sector through the next multi-annual
02:37financial framework, as the EU budget is renewed every seven years.
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