raised $4.2 million<\/a> in a 2023 seed funding round.<\/p>AFRL Award<\/h4>
In addition to the 2025 spaceflight demonstration, Proteus Space has won $3.3 million Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) awards in 2024.<\/p>
Under a $1.8 million AFWERX STTR contract awarded in July, Proteus Space will work with the University of California, Davis, Center for Spaceflight Research to autonomously design, build and environmentally qualify a custom satellite bus in less than 10 months. <\/p>
The award follows a phase one SBIR award Proteus Space won in December and a direct to phase two SBIR contract award in February.<\/p>
Proteus Space was established by Kervin and Andrew Shapiro, who worked at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory for 20 years, managing a portfolio of spacecraft technologies. Shapiro earned a PhD in materials science from the University of California, Irvine.<\/p>
AI Component<\/h4>
Once Mercury knows what subsystems a satellite will need, it \u201cexplores the entire mission-closing trade space computationally,\u201d Kervin said.<\/p>
In a demonstration for potential customers, Mercury relied on generative design to evaluate 2,300 possible spaceflight configurations in about 10 minutes. Another benefit to Mercury, Kervin said, is its ability to modify designs if a payload’s size, weight or power demands change.<\/p>
\u201cMercury can redesign that bus in the time that it takes you to add a calendar invite to get the engineers all together to discuss the engineering change proposal,\u201d Kervin said.<\/p>
Free Designs<\/h4>
To attract new customers, Proteus Space plans to offer qualified customers free preliminary designs for ESPA LEO satellites.<\/p>
\u201cWe do an initial technical call with the prospective customer under a non-disclosure agreement to see if we believe Mercury can solve for their particular mission, funding and timeline,\u201d Kervin said.<\/p>
If it\u2019s a good fit, Proteus Space will deliver preliminary designs in 10 days. Proteus Space also \u201cplans to offer physics, hardware, testing and flight-anchored models to customers in unlocked digital versions.\u201d<\/p>
ESPA is an acronym within an acronym. The E stands for Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle. The remaining letters mean Secondary Payload Adapter.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SAN FRANCISCO \u2013 Los Angeles startup Proteus Space plans to launch in 2025 what it says will be \u201cthe world\u2019s first AI-designed\u201d ESPA-class satellite. The ESPA low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10917,"featured_media":505911,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":false,"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"mc4wp_mailchimp_campaign":[],"newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5680,4161],"tags":[3357,4584,12238,2125],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[986],"class_list":["post-505910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ai","category-news-archive","tag-afwerx","tag-proteus-space","tag-sbir-sttr","tag-startups","entry"],"yoast_head":"\n
Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite - SpaceNews<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Debra Werner\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7a56860dea7b868ccd3237a38dead56c\"},\"headline\":\"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite\",\"datePublished\":\"2024-09-16T12:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-09-16T15:26:35+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/\"},\"wordCount\":518,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1\",\"keywords\":[\"AFWERX\",\"Proteus Space\",\"SBIR\/STTR\",\"startups\"],\"articleSection\":[\"AI\",\"News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/\",\"name\":\"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite - SpaceNews\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1\",\"datePublished\":\"2024-09-16T12:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-09-16T15:26:35+00:00\",\"description\":\"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1\",\"width\":1866,\"height\":1106,\"caption\":\"Proteus Space designs custom satellites with Mercury, an intelligent software orchestration system.\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/\",\"name\":\"SpaceNews\",\"description\":\"Covering the business and politics of space\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"SpaceNews\",\"alternateName\":\"SN\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/logo2x2.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/logo2x2.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1\",\"width\":200,\"height\":200,\"caption\":\"SpaceNews\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/SpaceNewsInc\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/SpaceNews_Inc\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/668857\/\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SpaceNews_Inc\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7a56860dea7b868ccd3237a38dead56c\",\"name\":\"Debra Werner\",\"description\":\"Debra Werner is a correspondent for SpaceNews based in San Francisco. Debra earned a bachelor\u2019s degree in communications from the University of California, Berkeley, and a master\u2019s degree in Journalism from Northwestern University. She is a recipient of the 1989 Gerald Ford Prize for Distinguished Reporting on National Defense.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/x.com\/spacereportr\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/author\/debra\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite - SpaceNews","description":"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/"},"author":{"name":"Debra Werner","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7a56860dea7b868ccd3237a38dead56c"},"headline":"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite","datePublished":"2024-09-16T12:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2024-09-16T15:26:35+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/"},"wordCount":518,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1","keywords":["AFWERX","Proteus Space","SBIR\/STTR","startups"],"articleSection":["AI","News"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/","url":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/","name":"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite - SpaceNews","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1","datePublished":"2024-09-16T12:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2024-09-16T15:26:35+00:00","description":"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1","contentUrl":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1","width":1866,"height":1106,"caption":"Proteus Space designs custom satellites with Mercury, an intelligent software orchestration system."},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/proteus-space-to-launch-ai-designed-espa-satellite\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Proteus Space to launch AI-designed ESPA satellite"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/","name":"SpaceNews","description":"Covering the business and politics of space","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#organization","name":"SpaceNews","alternateName":"SN","url":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/logo2x2.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1","contentUrl":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/logo2x2.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1","width":200,"height":200,"caption":"SpaceNews"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/SpaceNewsInc\/","https:\/\/x.com\/SpaceNews_Inc","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/668857\/","https:\/\/twitter.com\/SpaceNews_Inc"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7a56860dea7b868ccd3237a38dead56c","name":"Debra Werner","description":"Debra Werner is a correspondent for SpaceNews based in San Francisco. Debra earned a bachelor\u2019s degree in communications from the University of California, Berkeley, and a master\u2019s degree in Journalism from Northwestern University. She is a recipient of the 1989 Gerald Ford Prize for Distinguished Reporting on National Defense.","sameAs":["https:\/\/x.com\/spacereportr"],"url":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/author\/debra\/"}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spacenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Screenshot-2024-09-15-at-3.17.09\u202fPM.png?fit=1866%2C1106&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10917"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=505910"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505910\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":505988,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505910\/revisions\/505988"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/505911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=505910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=505910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=505910"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=505910"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=505910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}