Space: meeting in Rome between the Chief of Staff of the Air Force and the President of Axiom Space

A meeting took place in Rome over the past few days, at the Palazzo dell’Aeronautica, between the Chief of Staff of the Italian Air Force, Air Squad General Luca Goretti, and the President and CEO of Axiom Space, Michael Suffredini.

The meeting, which followed the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between Italian government and the company Axiom Space, signed at Palazzo Chigi between the Minister for Technological Innovation and Digital Transition Vittorio Colao and Suffredini himself, provided an opportunity for mutual appreciation of the programmes that the Armed Force and the US company are carrying out synergistically in the aerospace field.

The Italian Air Force considers collaboration with strategic Axiom Space and the programmes and activities being developed synergistically are the basis of the commitments and challenges in the aerospace field that will involve the Armed Force in the near future. Of particular relevance, among the projects initiated, is the training that Col. Walter Villadei is undertaking in Houston as professional astronaut, at NASA, as part of a broader collaboration and exchange agreement with Axiom. The same US company expressed enthusiasm about strengthening its collaboration with the Italian Government and the Italian Air Force, particularly in view of a flight as early as 2023 that will represent an opportunity for scientific and technological experimentation and the promotion of national expertise.

Among the most important and ambitious projects for Axiom Space is certainly that of the construction, in collaboration with NASA, of a new commercial space station.

The agreement signed with the Italian Government aims precisely to deepen cooperation for the development and implementation of projects in the aerospace sector, with the intention of achieving the following objectives:

• the promotion of the low Earth orbit market to concretely develop a resilient space economy;
• the development of a public-private partnership model for a modern efficient and economical space infrastructure integrated with the future Axiom space station, which can enable the research in microgravity and ensure the continuity of technological developments and in-orbit operations following the decommissioning of the International Space Station;
• the promotion of collaborative research projects in the field of advanced materials, pharmaceuticals, in-orbit manufacturing of innovative technologies for suborbital applications, space safety and security, modelling and simulation, aerospace medicine, artificial intelligence and robotics;
• the enhancement of the excellent and historic bilateral relations between the United States and Italy, with cooperation also in the field of space flight commercial seen as an opportunity to develop a new chapter of human presence around the Earth and on the Moon for the benefit of all humanity.

Read the news on the MITD website