In space travel, components must be able to withstand extreme conditions. After all, you can’t stop by for maintenance. With this in mind, engineers work at the cutting edge to get the most out of the materials. With an investment of €350,000 from Early Phase Financing powered by UNIIQ, Arceon can further develop and market its new heat-resistant materials, enabling engineers to innovate further. The investment was announced by Martijn Leinweber, COO of SBIC Noordwijk and programme manager of ESA BIC Noordwijk.
The ESA BIC Noordwijk startup Arceon develops special composites that can withstand extremely high temperatures (>1500 °C). These composites, which include carbon, are also much lighter than the currently used alternatives, which consist of special metals. The so-called ceramic matrix composites (CMC) from Arceon can therefore already be used in jet engines of satellites. In the future, applications such as heat shields for spacecraft returning to Earth through the atmosphere will also become possible.
Arceon also makes it possible to produce these CMCs at scale with a number of innovations in the production process. At the helm of Arceon are founders Rahul Shirke and Rahul Sharma, who have specialist knowledge of this type of materials in the space sector. The team is strengthened by the years of experience of co-founder Bernhard Heidenreich. As a result, the company already owns a patent on the in-situ combination of smaller sub-segments of the technology. As a result, complex shapes can be made with much greater ease, and without additional process errors, by combining smaller ones. This not only significantly reduces lead time, but also makes quality more manageable. This gives engineers many times more freedom in their designs.
With the UNIIQ investment, Arceon will market a number of initial products in collaboration with a number of pilot and launch customers. In addition, the company will investigate applications in other markets, expand the team with 3 FTE and bring the necessary equipment in-house.
This news was originally published on the Innovation Quarter website on 7 July 2023.
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