by Eigirdas Sarkanas
The space domain is transforming. While public discourse often focuses on the activities of a few global billionaires and legacy aerospace powers, a more significant trend is emerging: smaller nations asserting their technological competence and defining their future through high-tech specialization.
This shift signals that strategic focus and ingenuity, not just raw economic power, are key to the New Space economy, offering countries like Lithuania a path to global leadership. The nation is becoming a notable example of how focused public policy and advanced technological expertise can stimulate a space sector.
From First Launch to Full-Fledged Space Industry Lithuania’s journey from a non-space nation to a player in the field began in 2014, with the successful launch of its first two indigenous satellites: LituanicaSAT-1 and LitSat-1—small CubeSat-class satellites, developed by collaborative teams from various universities, investors, and space enthusiasts.
This historical moment was more than a symbolic victory; it was the genesis of the Lithuanian commercial space ecosystem. The core team of students behind this pioneering effort went on to found NanoAvionics, a small satellite mission integrator and manufacturer specializing in high-performance CubeSats and nanosatellites. The company’s trajectory culminated in it becoming a subsidiary of Norway’s Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace in 2022, a clear signal of its global competitiveness.
This foundational success spurred a wave of technological spin-offs. The same cohort of engineers later established Blackswan Space, which offers an Autonomy-as-a-Service platform for complex space missions, and Astrolight, pioneering high-speed space-to-ground laser communication links. This chain of innovation presents a self-sustaining Lithuanian entrepreneurial spirit, turning academic achievement into commercial ventures.
The strategic commitment to the industry was formalized when Lithuania achieved Associate Member status in the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2021. This move provided the ecosystem with a clear, long-term strategic direction and access to significant funding streams. In the wake of this, Lithuania, under Innovation Agency Lithuania, established the Space Hub LT unit to mobilize and promote its community and launched the ESA Business Incubation Centre (ESA BIC LT) to nurture new initiatives.
The numbers clearly illustrate this quick acceleration. While the first two years of ESA membership presented challenges, the ecosystem has since capitalized on the opportunity. Currently, the Lithuanian space ecosystem, comprising over forty business and scientific institutions, holds more than fifty contracts with the European Space Agency, valued at approximately €8 million. Crucially, approximately two-thirds of these contracts were signed in 2024 and 2025 alone, a sharp increase from the mere four contracts secured in 2021-2022.
Lithuania’s Regulatory Role: Shaping the EU Space Act Lithuania is also growing its leadership in European Union (EU) space policy. The new European Commissioner for Defence and Space, former Lithuanian Prime Minister Andrius Kubilius, is leading the development of the EU Space Act.
This wide-ranging regulation is designed to harmonize rules for safety, resilience, and sustainability across the Union. Notably, the Act is anticipated to have an extraterritorial scope, applying to non-EU operators (including U.S. companies) that provide space services or data in the EU market, solidifying the Union’s role as a regulatory power in the global space ecosystem.
This push for harmonization is essential to resolve the current market fragmentation. Today, approximately half of the EU member states have national space laws that differ significantly in their technical requirements, application methods, and required technologies. For Lithuanian companies that have flourished through deep-tech specialization and that operate across borders, this means navigating a complex and costly labyrinth of conflicting national rules. They are often forced to spend time and capital modifying products for each distinct national market, which increases costs for both buyers and sellers, simply because the common EU market is, in practice, segmented by national regulatory priorities.
While the EU Space Act, slated to take effect in 2030, will streamline cross-border operations, it introduces new compliance hurdles, particularly for supply chain management. The Act will require that all companies and state institutions are prepared to assess technologies against strict EU standards, covering everything from environmental impact to infrastructure resilience. For Lithuania’s ecosystem, which relies on global suppliers for many core components, this means needing detailed technical information for every part used in a satellite or other product. Suppose third-country suppliers are unwilling to share this proprietary data because the European space market is not commercially significant to them. In that case, EU companies may be forced to seek alternative, potentially more expensive suppliers, which could increase production costs and, in extreme cases, slow down technological progress.
Turnover Indicates the Increasing Value Nevertheless, the Lithuanian space ecosystem is keen to expand and make a significant presence in the EU space market. The government’s contribution has also fueled this motivation. Lately, Lithuania’s Ministry of Economy and Innovation recognized the sector’s potential by increasing its funding. The budget for 2023–2025, which was initially €9 million, was raised by €5.5 million, representing a 62 percent increase.
To help high-tech sectors grow, and recognizing the crucial role of the North American market in achieving that, Lithuania has also prioritized initiatives to facilitate transatlantic cooperation. Innovation Agency Lithuania, a non-profit Lithuanian business facilitator under the Ministry of Economy and Innovation of the Republic of Lithuania, runs InnoHub Lithuania in Silicon Valley, which is specifically designed to help innovative Lithuanian businesses navigate and enter the challenging U.S. market.
This support is already yielding results, with companies like Delta Biosciences, Super Garden, NanoAvionics, Sensmetry, and Blackswan Space reporting growing activities and expanding their footprints in the United States. This engagement is a two-way street, providing U.S. partners access to deep-tech expertise often at a competitive cost.
This governmental investment is directly correlated with the sector’s own commercial success. Its turnover has shown consistent growth: from just over €26 million in 2022, it rose to €34.5 million in 2023, and approximately €35 million in 2024. These results align with the key message: the Lithuanian space sector shows the potential for rapid development due to significant technological demand.
Perhaps the most compelling evidence of sector maturity is the recent landmark contract secured by NanoAvionics—a €122.5 million deal to produce 280 satellites for a major U.S. client, SpinLaunch. This contract is not merely a revenue boost; it requires the company to expand its production capacity in Vilnius and hire approximately 100 additional engineers and experts by 2030, reinforcing the entire ecosystem’s labor market and manufacturing base.
Funding Constraints and Talent Pipeline Gaps Other challenges the Lithuanian space sector faces are the kind of challenges typical of any rapidly expanding, high-tech industry—what can be framed as “good problems to solve.”
The primary challenge remains funding. The ecosystem’s growth rate has already outstripped allocated state resources. The state budget funds allocated for the 2023-2025 period were fully utilized by early 2025. This fact, however, is a positive indicator; it proves that the ecosystem is developing genuine, tangible technological innovations that require capital.
This accelerated consumption of funds is largely due to the sector’s focus. According to the ESA’s own assessments, Lithuania is uniquely concentrated on more “upstream” (developing core technologies, hardware, and components) rather than “downstream” (developing end-user services based on satellite data) technologies. Upstream technology development, requiring high technological readiness levels (TRL 4, 5, or even 6), naturally demands several times more capital than downstream services. The challenge, therefore, is to ensure this rapid technological momentum is not abruptly halted by hitting a financial wall, which would risk losing the technological advantage already gained.
Another pervasive issue is the shortage of specialized talent. While this is common across all high-tech sectors in Europe, the problem is compounded in Lithuania by a lack of dedicated space-oriented studies or sufficient modules within higher education. The technology is advancing faster than the public and academic sectors can react. Nonetheless, sustainable growth requires a dedicated national strategy to produce the next generation of local space engineers and scientists.
The Horizontal Approach: Leveraging Existing Deep Tech Expertise Lithuania’s strategy has centered on what can be termed a “horizontal approach” to space development: exploiting high technology sectors and applying them to space challenges. This avoids the prohibitive cost of building a full vertical aerospace industry from scratch, focusing instead on niches where the country already holds a competitive advantage: lasers and biotechnology.
Lithuania is globally recognized as a powerhouse in laser and optics technology. This expertise directly contributes to specialized space applications. For instance, Astrolight leverages this core strength to develop advanced space-to-ground laser communication links, which provide secure, high-bandwidth data transmission essential for next-generation satellite constellations. Integrated Optics is a high-tech manufacturer of compact laser sources that are critical for sensitive applications such as spectroscopy, flow cytometry, and LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) systems, which are used in both Earth observation and interplanetary missions. Additionally, Lidaris offers professional laser damage testing, an important service that ensures the reliability and longevity of optical components in the harsh environment of space.
Similarly, Lithuania’s biotechnology sector is finding unique applications in space. For example, Delta Biosciences has been chosen by NASA and its partners to join the renowned Space-H program, which focuses on advancing innovations in space healthcare. The company plans to develop radioprotective medicines designed to protect astronauts during long-duration missions and to be used in radiation therapy for cancer patients.
The Lithuanian ecosystem has successfully carved out other specialized niche areas as well. The Lithuanian company, called Sensmetry, specializes in complex systems engineering solutions critical for managing intricate satellite networks and space mission planning, while Super Garden addresses the logistics of long-duration missions by developing and producing special space food solutions. Blackswan Space is also worth mentioning in this case. The company continues to push the envelope with its Autonomy-as-a-Service platform, which is essential for reducing human intervention and managing large satellite swarms autonomously.
Lithuanian space technologies are also increasingly interconnected with the defense sector, focusing on secure data links, advanced surveillance, and resilient satellite operations, reflecting the global trend of dual-use technology.
Fostering Transatlantic Collaboration Lithuania’s commitment, evidenced by its funding increases and the commercial success of high-tech companies, signals that its space ecosystem is a serious, long-term partner. Lithuania has positioned itself as a vital source of critical space components and expertise both within the European Space Agency (ESA) framework and beyond.
The sector’s accelerated growth, while stressing current state funding and talent pipelines, signifies a mature and innovation-hungry market. For global business leaders, particularly those in North America’s aerospace, defense, and legal sectors, Lithuania represents a compelling opportunity to access world-class, cost-competitive deep tech and engage with an ecosystem driven by a clear national mandate for growth at the upcoming North America-Lithuania Business Forum in Los Angeles from April 27 to April 29, 2026.
Eigirdas Sarkanas an expert in space policy, technology and innovation at Space Hub LT, Innovation Agency Lithuania, the official public agency responsible for the development of the Lithuanian innovation ecosystem and the promotion of innovation. He can be reached at E.Sarkanas@inovacijuagentura.lt.