February 10, 2026

Swiss Satellite Manufacturer SWISSto12 Secures Over 100 Million Euros for HummingSat Platform

SWISSto12 has secured over €100 million to advance the industrialization of its HummingSat satellite platform. The funding combines €73 million from European Space Agency (ESA) member states through the ARTES HummingSat Partnership Project with additional capital from European private investors raised in the second half of 2025.

The funding was committed at the ESA Council at Ministerial Level in November 2025, with backing from Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Sweden, Norway, and associate member Canada.

Compact Geostationary Satellites

HummingSat is a new class of compact geostationary satellite with a volume of 1.5 cubic metres – approximately one-tenth the size of traditional geostationary satellites – and a launch mass of around 1,000 kilograms. The satellites will operate at 36,000 kilometres above Earth with an operational lifespan of 15 years.
The first HummingSat is scheduled to launch in 2027 for customer SES, with additional satellites to follow for Viasat.

Investment Focus

The funding will support the development and industrialization of HummingSat, expand manufacturing capacity, and advance phased-array antenna technologies for LEO, MEO, and GEO satellite payloads as well as ground-based user terminals.

“The recent subscriptions of member states and cooperating states at the ESA Ministerial Council to the HummingSat Project, and the latest round of funding from European private investors sends a strong message to the global market that SWISSto12 is at the heart of satellite communications innovation,” said Emile de Rijk, CEO and Founder of SWISSto12. “With our growing suite of agile, cost-effective and highly performant satellite communications solutions, we provide a credible answer to some of the most pressing challenges facing the space economy, including the critical issue of enabling satellite sovereignty – something, until now, out of reach for most of the world’s nations.”

Laurent Jaffart, ESA Director of Connectivity and Secure Communications, said: “We are proud to continue our support of SWISSto12, particularly in creating cost-effective solutions for satellite systems that answer to the satellite communications ecosystem’s ever-increasing demands. ESA is committed to elevating Europe’s future in space through our support of industry, and by accelerating next-generation satellite technologies.”

Additive Manufacturing Technology

Based in Renens near Lausanne, SWISSto12 holds one of the world’s largest patent portfolios for the use of additive manufacturing in radio frequency applications. The company has successfully deployed over 1,000 functional 3D-printed products in space with zero failures since signing its first ESA contract in 2015.