21 March 2019 – The Department for International Trade is organising a UK Technology & Capability Showcase for SpaceX in late spring or early summer 2019 (date to be confirmed later) at SpaceX’s HQ in Hawthorne, California.

The SpaceX technology development and procurement teams for the Starship (formerly known as the BFR) and Starlink programmes will review UK supplier capability descriptions and select the participants. Therefore, if you have a UK-based capability that you think SpaceX would be interested in, please register for the event and submit your capability summaries.

You will need to complete the blank template. This is in the same file where you will also find an example template with instructions to help. Send your submissions to Henry.Sayers@trade.gov.uk by COP 27 March 2019. You can also download a useful guidance document with information about the timelines and what activities will be undertaken.

In addition to the best of UK’s capabilities that we will be offering to SpaceX, they have identified some specific capabilities and technologies that they require. If you can satisfy any of these needs, then you should certainly submit a set of forms:

Pressure & Motion Controls, Actuation (“Vendor IP”):

1. Solenoid Valves for high vibration, low and high temperature environments

• Strong and nimble engineering departments
• Environmental analysis on site is a plus (vibe testing greater >90 Grms)

2. Brushless DC & Inductance Motors for high vibration, low and high temp environments

• Same features as the above Valve category

Machining/Fabrication:

3. Spline/Gear machining (preferably located in or near other machining suppliers, think turn-key turbomachinery shafts)

4. Turbomachining (blades, impellers that are smaller than a 24” cube)

5. Large OD tube bending >8” OD

6. Shaped or Formed Flexible Hoses (primarily Kevlar braided Teflon hose that is formed to a particular shape to reduce stress)

7. Aerospace Metal Bellows formed with new technologies (standard technologies are mechanical forming, edge welding, hydroforming, or electroformed – looking for any new technologies or suppliers that may excel with the current technologies)

Castings/Raw Materials:

8. Specialized castings (new innovative casting methods)

9. Die casting suppliers

10. Specialized materials (for extreme environments)

Avionics:

11. Large format PCB fabrication and PCBA assembly (>30”)

12. Solar panel assembly

After all the capability and technology submissions have been collected, DIT’s in-market specialist, Bill Peterson, will review them and provide feedback. There will be an opportunity to revise submissions, after which DIT will collate the final submissions into a formal UK Technology & Capability Brochure for the SpaceX team to review and select participants. There is no fee to submit a capability. However, a registration fee of £770 will be charged to the attendees. DIT aims to have the final list of participants one month before the event in order to allow them to book travel for a reasonable rate.