Blackswan Space Secures €600k ESA Contract to Advance Vision-Based Navigation product

Blackswan Space has been awarded a €600k contract by the European Space Agency (ESA) to mature its Vision-Based Navigation (VBN) aka RPO Kit product to Technology Readiness Level 6 (TRL6) over the next 12 months. The project will accelerate the path to flight for autonomous proximity operations and docking, supporting in-orbit servicing (IOS) mission ASTRAL planned for 2028.

This new contract builds on Blackswan Space’s recent success under ESA’s General Support Technology Programme (GSTP), where the company advanced its VBN system to TRL5 through a €250k effort. That milestone included the build and test of a VBN prototype at ESA’s GRALS facility, demonstrating real-time navigation on space-representative hardware.

Under the TRL6 maturation, Blackswan Space will extend testing to more demanding and diverse scenarios, integrate the VBN stack with spacecraft guidance, navigation, and control (GNC) systems, and deepen product assurance activities in line with ECSS standards. The campaign will include hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing, environmental evaluations (e.g., thermal-vacuum and vibration), and end-to-end demonstrations in relevant environments to validate performance, reliability, and mission readiness.

Blackswan Space’s VBN system combines machine-learning techniques with proven marker-based methods, delivering precise relative navigation for close-approach and docking while maintaining modularity for different mission profiles. The ESA contract comes with Lithuanian Space delegation support and is funded via ESA GSTP Element-1 instrument.