Iterative Engineering, Wolności 191/913, Zabrze (2026)

23/07/2026

Satellite check-out

The clean room is not the end of the story. It is the point at which the payload must demonstrate readiness.

This is the seventh post in our series on payload preparations. After the clean room, the next stage is satellite check-out, where tests, measurements, and operational decisions start to shape what happens next.

This is where the engineering work becomes very concrete. Electrical and mechanical checks, launch-configuration preparation, and risk-driven verification all come together in one tightly controlled phase.

In practice, that can involve:
• functional tests of spacecraft subsystems
• leak checks and pressurisation work on propulsion-related systems
• validation of EGSE and other support equipment
• telemetry checks and coordination with mission teams following the campaign from elsewhere.

What matters here is not only whether the hardware works, but whether it is ready to move forward without creating new uncertainty later in the campaign.

That is also why the check-out rooms matter so much. This is where mission teams monitor parameters, follow the sequence, and decide whether to continue or stop and return to diagnostics.

The supporting infrastructure behind this stage is broader than many people expect. At the spaceport, check-out can involve laboratories, weighing areas, environmental monitoring, electromagnetic compatibility work, and additional safety measures around pressurised systems.

For a broader look at the full launch campaign process, not just this stage, see our full article. It draws on our work developing a digital tool for payload campaign operations and on firsthand experience at the Guiana Space Centre, within the European launch ecosystem of ESA and CNES.

Image credit: ESA-Service Optique CSG

14/07/2026

Poland is getting its own ESA centre. At a press conference attended by ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher and the heads of the Polish government, it was announced that Warsaw will host a new Agency facility dedicated to civil security and crisis management. The centre will focus on dual-use security research, satellite communications, and crisis response – including flood monitoring and border surveillance. Pre-operational activities are expected to begin in 2027. According to the head of European Space Agency - ESA, it will be the Agency's first centre in a country outside the founding states of 1975.

For the Polish space sector, the stakes go well beyond a single building. The decision follows commitments made at the ESA Ministerial Council in Bremen, where Poland pledged EUR 731 million to the Agency's programmes – nearly quadrupling its previous contribution. The centre is expected to accelerate the transfer of knowledge and technology between the Agency and Polish companies, and to broaden access to security programmes and ESA procurement – for established firms, research institutes, and startups. The government has also announced a network integrating space industry infrastructure across the candidate cities, backed by a fund worth half a billion złoty.

Seven candidates competed for the location: Gdańsk, Kraków, Łódź, Poznań, Warsaw, Wrocław, and the GZM. Górnośląsko-Zagłębiowska Metropolia together with the Silesian Voivodeship. We were rooting for Silesia – our headquarters is in Zabrze – but above all, congratulations are in order.

All the more so because the Silesian bid showed how seriously the region takes space. A concept by Tomasz Rożek, PhD and the Fundacja Nauka. To Lubię proposes transforming the decommissioned Wujek coal mine into a Space Settlement Simulation Centre: an underground analogue habitat, a proving ground for rovers, test laboratories, and a microgravity tower built into the mine shafts. A shaft several hundred metres deep allows around 10 seconds of free fall – ten times longer than surface-based facilities of this kind. The Ministry of Science has pledged around PLN 2 million for a feasibility study. Several hundred metres underground, conditions are closer to the Moon than in any sterile laboratory on the surface: dust, no GPS, complete isolation.

We know from our own experience that space competence already exists in Silesia today. Our team designed a system to support satellite launch campaign management and tested it during a two-day simulation with the ESA and CNES teams at the Guiana Space Centre in Kourou. You can read about what working at Europe's Spaceport looks like and how the tests went on our blog – link in the first comment.

The ESA centre in Warsaw opens a new chapter. Silesia is writing its own in parallel – from the underground workings of the Wujek mine to the spaceport in French Guiana.

10/07/2026

We recently had the opportunity to conduct comprehensive project workshops in collaboration with HANDEN Sp. z o.o., an energy trading company focused on gas fuel and electricity.

During intensive sessions involving domain experts and technical specialists, we detailed the functional requirements and key technical frameworks for the new Business Customer & Billing System.

We deeply value the outcomes of this joint effort and the wealth of insights we developed together. The best summary of this stage, and a proud achievement for our team, is the feedback shared by Łukasz Redkiewicz (Head of Trading at Handen):

“Cooperation with you was of a very high standard, both in terms of substance and organization.”

A huge thank you to the entire team at Handen sp. z o.o. for an excellent collaboration and outstanding commitment!

03/07/2026

Clean room

If the airlock controls access, the clean room controls the working environment.

This is the sixth post in our series on payload preparations. After the airlock, the next stage is the environment most people associate with spacecraft work: the clean room.

But in practice, a clean room is much more than white coveralls and filtered air. It is the heart of the payload preparation facility, the place where inspections, final assembly, and some of the most delicate campaign activities take place.

In practice, that can involve:
• strict entry procedures for people, tools, and equipment
• airborne particle monitoring and contamination control
• overpressure to keep contaminants from being drawn inside
• witness plates and other checks to verify what actually settles on surfaces.

That changes how the work is done. Cleanliness here goes far beyond visual cleanliness. It is about protecting the payload from particles, handling errors, and environmental effects that may be insignificant in other industries, but unacceptable in spaceflight.

The discipline goes further than many people expect. At this stage, work hygiene, how tools are brought in, how surfaces are cleaned, how teams are separated, and even how vibrations are reduced all become part of the operational picture.

For a broader look at the full launch campaign process, not just this stage, see our full article. It draws on our work developing a digital tool for payload campaign operations and on firsthand experience at the Guiana Space Centre, within the European launch ecosystem of European Space Agency - ESA and Centre National d'Études Spatiales.

Link in the comments below.

Image credit: ESA-CNES-ARIANESPACE/Optique vidéo du CSG–S. Martin

02/07/2026

In this short video, Krzysztof Gąsior, CEO of Iterative Engineering, talks about using geospatial data, satellite orthoimagery, and custom software in renewables, biogas, green infrastructure, and industrial planning.

For companies working with complex investment locations, environmental constraints, and large-scale project scouting, software can turn geographic data into practical decision-support tools. Iterative Engineering has built advanced screening tools using algorithmic analysis of satellite orthoimagery to support faster assessment of potential investment sites.

01/07/2026

What do history, artificial intelligence, GIS systems, and 3D visualisation have in common?

At first glance, they may seem like tools from very different worlds. But in the right context, modern engineering technologies can help tell stories about the past with much greater clarity.

Our CTO, Paweł Grzywocz, recently used maps, geospatial data, digitisation, georeferencing, 3D modelling, and carefully applied AI techniques to explore the history of Giszowiec, his own district in Katowice.

Century-old paper maps, usually hidden away in archives, were digitised and overlaid onto contemporary basemaps. Historical building outlines were vectorised and placed in a 3D environment. This made it possible to visualise urban plans and concepts that were once designed, but never fully brought to life.

It is a different side of the tools we usually associate with engineering work. Not launch operations, industrial systems, or critical software, but local history, community, and the memory of a place.

A good reminder that technology does not always have to look forward.

Sometimes, it helps us look back more clearly.

Photos by Tomasz Pac

01/07/2026

This is the fifth post in our series on payload preparations. After the Transit Hall, the next stage is even more tightly controlled: the airlock.

Nobody just walks straight into a clean room at a spaceport. Between the outside world and the controlled environment where payloads are prepared, there is always a buffer – and that buffer does a lot more than most people assume.

At the Guiana Space Centre, the airlock sits between the general work areas and the clean room proper. It is a managed transition zone with its own logistics, checkpoints, and environmental requirements that govern the movement of people, equipment, and payloads between zones.

In practice, that can involve:
• separate entry paths for personnel and for payloads/equipment
• lockers, changing clothes, protective gear, and ESD control before entry
• air showers to remove dust and particles from protective clothing
• larger controlled transfer routes for trolleys, containers, and lifting operations.

Payload preparation requires controlled isolation. The cleanest zones have to stay protected while work continues around them – which is why overpressure, filtration, cleaning protocols, flow control, and even insect protection all become part of routine operations.

The requirements can go further still. According to on-site accounts in our article, during a particularly sensitive campaign, transfers were timed around nearby radar activity: the radar was temporarily reduced before the airlock was opened, to keep strong RF emissions away from delicate electronics and instruments.

For a broader look at the full launch campaign process – not just this stage – see our full article. It draws on our work developing a digital tool for payload campaign operations and on firsthand experience at the Guiana Space Centre, within the European launch ecosystem of European Space Agency - ESA and CNES.

Link in the comments.

Image credit: ESA

01/07/2026

Iterative Engineering collaboration with the French industrial ecosystem is already a fact. We’ve completed a project for the French space agency CNES, developing tooling for satellite campaign management at the Guiana Space Centre in Kourou.

We want to extend our activities. The focus? Finding partners to engineer bespoke software solutions tailored specifically for high-stakes domains where sovereign control is key.

• Space sector - digitalizing critical ground operations and launch campaign management.

• Geospatial & renewables - transforming complex geodata and satellite imagery into automated, fully proprietary site-screening assets.

• Industrial oversight for the energy sector - building & integrating localized, high-performance software for process monitoring.

01/07/2026

Krzysztof Gąsior, CEO of Iterative Engineering, talks about custom software for the space and aerospace sector, including ground segments, launch campaigns, satellite systems, and critical space operations.

Iterative Engineering recently worked with CNES at the Guiana Space Centre to support launch campaign operations through dedicated digital tooling. This short video is an invitation to talk with teams working on satellite modules, ground segment software, and complex engineering workflows.

09/06/2026

Transit Hall

The payload does not go straight from its transport container into the clean room. First, it enters a less visible but absolutely essential space: the Transit Hall.

This is the fourth post in our series on payload preparations. After the road to Kourou and the logic of the EPCU facilities, the next step is the first stop inside the spaceport flow: the reception and transfer area.

At this stage, the point is not yet precision work on the spacecraft itself. The point is to receive the cargo safely, protect it from the outside environment, and prepare it for transfer into zones with tighter requirements.

In practice, that can involve:
• unloading the transport container
• protecting both hardware and crew from weather exposure
• organising the first controlled move toward the next zone
• using cranes, forklifts, special tools, air cushions, or dedicated transport trolleys, depending on the campaign setup

And that matters, because this is where payload preparation begins to become a question of movement under constraints. How do you lift, move, and position delicate cargo without compromising the conditions it needs before entering the next area?

For a more comprehensive look at payload preparations – not just this stage, but the broader launch-campaign process – see our full article, informed by our work on a digital tool for payload-campaign operations and by first-hand company experience gathered during our time at the Guiana Space Centre, within the wider European launch ecosystem of the European Space Agency - ESA and CNES.

Link in the comments below.

Image credit: © CNES/ESA/Arianespace-ArianeGroup/Optique Vidéo CSG/S Martin, 2025

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