A German company is poised to send a rocket into space from Norway

Under the shimmering aurora borealis, a rocket readies for take-off beside a Norwegian fjord. Isar Aerospace, a German startup, is running countdown procedures at the Andoya Space Centre, hoping for the first time to put an object into orbit from continental Europe. The launch, first scheduled for January 21st but delayed for technical reasons, is expected any day. If successful, it would mark a leap for Europe’s modest space ambitions.

Europe is desperate to launch satellites. A look at Ukraine’s battlefields explains why. Starlink, Elon Musk’s constellation of telecom satellites, has been crucial for Ukraine’s armed forces. Relying on a company run by a Europe-basher for defence is imprudent and costly. Space autonomy is an urgent geostrategic imperative for Europe, says Toni Tolker-Nielsen, director of space transportation at the Paris-based European Space Agency (ESA).

To launch satellites on its own rockets, Europe currently sails them 6,000km to French Guiana in South America. The ESA’s spaceport in Kourou is well suited for certain missions. Its low latitude takes advantage of the fact that the Earth rotates fastest at the equator, giving rockets a bit of a boost towards orbital velocity and saving fuel and money. But one spaceport is not enough. Of the 324 orbital launches in 2025, just eight were European. America managed 193, China 93 and Russia 17.

Three spaceports are vying to offer launches directly from Europe: Andoya in Norway, Esrange in Sweden, and SaxaVord in Scotland’s Shetland Islands. High-latitude launches are more fuel-efficient for polar and sun-synchronous orbits (SSO), which pass over the same points on Earth at the same local time each day. SSO satellites also maintain the same angle towards the sun, so the lighting remains constant in imagery they transmit. That makes them ideal for tracking troop movements, new construction or retreating glaciers.

Andoya is in the lead for now. It has dedicated an entire launch pad to Isar. The mostly privately funded company was founded in 2018 by engineering students in a Bavarian cowshed. It attempted an orbital launch in March 2025 from Andoya, but its Spectrum rocket plunged into the sea. Isar said it gathered useful data; most maiden flights suffer similar fates.

The space gap between Europe and other players used to be less stark. But Europe’s state-oriented programmes were overtaken thanks to the innovation and risk-taking of private American firms like SpaceX, says Hermann Ludwig Moeller of the European Space Policy Institute, a think-tank in Vienna. A successful launch from Norway by a privately funded rocket designed in Germany would help put the continent back on the map.■