Based in Paris Dark space tackles the twin problems of debris and conflict in orbit with its mobile platform designed to launch, attach and ultimately deorbit uncooperative objects in space.
Dark CEO Clyde Laheyne said the company aims to become “the SWAT team of space.”
The three-year-old startup is developing Interceptor, a spacecraft that is essentially a rocket-powered boxing glove that can be launched in a short time to gently pry a wayward object out of its orbit.
The Interceptor itself is launched from a specially equipped aircraft. Much like a Virgin Galactic launch, the plane will take the rocket above the tumultuous lower atmosphere, where it can be released and ignited. Once the rocket reaches the vicinity of the target object, the spacecraft detaches and uses onboard sensors and propulsion to find and approach it. When properly aligned, the Interceptor pushes against the object with its padded “effector”, ultimately deorbiting it.
“The entire space sector is organized to perform planned, long missions…but orbital defense is more about short, unplanned missions,” Laheyne said. In that sense, the Interceptor “is more like an air defense missile,” he explained. “He has to be ready at all times. There is no viable excuse not to use it.
However, unlike a real missile or anti-satellite weapon, the Interceptor’s soft strike does not produce a debris field or other dangerous and unpredictable effects.
Dark Space was founded by Laheyne and CTO Guillaume Orvain, engineers who cut their teeth at multinational missile developer MBDA. This professional experience is reflected in the Interceptor concept, designed to operate on call, like missile systems. That’s also why Dark is developing its own launch platform: to ensure defense, civilian and commercial companies are ready at all times, Laheyne said.
The co-founders of Dark Space, Clyde Laheyne and Guillaume Orvain. Image credit: Dark
Dark closed a $5 million seed round in 2021, with a cap table made up of European investors, including lead investor Eurazeo. The team closed a $6 million expansion yesterday, including participation from its first US-based investor, Long Journey Ventures. (This fund is led by Arielle Zuckerberg, the younger sister of Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg.)
The company still has a lot of work to do before it can remove something like a defunct rocket second stage from orbit. Dark focused on the development of critical systems, such as the cryogenic engine and software. The team is now focused on developing the technologies needed for the type of rapid, unanticipated missions that Interceptor will execute, such as long-range detection and tracking, autonomous flight algorithms, and a reliable controlled re-entry system.
The team also needs to upgrade an aircraft — which Laheyne said could cost $50 million, about the price of building a new launch pad — and prepare the entire platform for a demonstration mission in 2026.
This mission would validate many of the platform’s core technologies on a large scale, although it will not actually aim to deorbit an object, just hit one. Even this is incredibly ambitious: no company has yet succeeded in so-called rendezvous and proximity operations, that is, approaching and interacting with another object in space.
The second demonstration mission, currently planned for 2027, will include a deorbit attempt. If all goes according to plan, the company would begin deorbiting objects on behalf of allied civilian agencies. As for defense customers, “I hope we don’t have to use it,” Laheyne said.
“I’ve been doing missiles for years, and it’s always the same thing: If you use it first, it’s an act of war. If you are second, it is an act of defense. If you can do it and people know you can do it, that’s a deterrent,” he said. “The ideal is deterrence, the system that makes conflict unthinkable.”
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