Space Sector Looks to Hampshire

Southampton Science Park was pleased to attend the Farnborough International Space Show, which brings together the global space community across industry, defence, government and academia, this March.

For 2025, the event focused on six themes: commercial space, operations and manufacturing, sustainability in space, security and defence, space exploration and earth observation. The programme covered a huge number of topics including climate change and environmental monitoring, sustainable land and marine resource management, resilient urban and infrastructure systems, and innovative earth observation technologies for adaption and mitigation.

Lucinda Lamont, Business Development Director at Southampton Science Park said, “We were delighted to attend this year’s International Space Show, sharing a stand with our colleagues from Space South Central which is doing excellent work in raising awareness of Hampshire as a leading force in the sector. We had many interesting conversations and strengthened relationships with key collaborators, including Frances Clarke and the whole team at Space South Central.”

The National Space Strategy prioritises the importance of regional space clusters; Space South Central is the largest of these in the UK. A partnership between industry and academia, it aims to accelerate space business growth, foster an environment of innovation, grow the reputation of the south-central region and contribute to national prosperity.

The region already has an impressive, globally recognised reputation for excellence in space research and innovation. Hampshire and Surrey in particular are highly active across the whole spectrum of space activity, with significant capabilities in satellite manufacture, launch technologies, next-generation communications, robotics and autonomous systems, and satellite data-enabled services.

Lucinda continued, “The pace of development in this sector is staggeringly rapid and our university researchers, spin-outs and established businesses have excellent opportunities to prosper. Southampton Science Park is pleased to support commercial operations in this growing and exciting sector and it was good to see resident companies AccelerComm and Multiple Access Communications growing their networks and collaboration potential at Farnborough. We look forward to welcoming more companies to the Park and boosting the South Central cluster further.”