Wednesday, November 11, 2026
Two New South Wales-based technology innovators have joined forces to create low-cost and lightweight solar panels that can be mounted on spacecraft and used to power them.
Space Machines Company (SMC), a Botany-based manufacturer of space hardware and software, and SunDrive Solar, a South Sydney-based solar technology company, announced on Tuesday that they had started a research and development collaboration to design, build and test solar panels for spacecraft.
The collaboration will combine SunDrive’s copper-metallised solar cell technology with SMC’s expertise in spacecraft structures, thermal engineering, and integration, to establish an Australian-made source of solar arrays for spacecraft.
According to the two companies, solar arrays remain one of the most critical and expensive parts of any spacecraft, with Australian satellite programs currently reliant on imported space-grade arrays, limiting both cost and supply.
But the two companies believe there is an opportunity to create lower-cost, locally developed solar arrays priced for spacecraft built and deployed at scale – an opportunity that reduce reliance on overseas suppliers and strengthen Australia’s sovereign space manufacturing base.
The first phase of the collaboration will run through to April 2027 and will produce a body-mounted solar panel for SMC’s next-generation Optimus Viper spacecraft, along with prototype flight-sized panels.
Subsequent phases will be decided upon following the successful completion of this first phase, and will likely aim at a flight-ready deployable solar array for SMC’s future spacecraft, as well as for the wider satellite market.
The body-mounted panel will go through the required environmental testing, including thermal-vacuum and vibration testing, and will produce the engineering and performance data necessary to progress a flight-ready product.
“This collaboration began because two Australian companies saw a commercial reason to work together,” said Rajat Kulshrestha, co-founder and CEO of Space Machines Company.
“Other nations are moving quickly to secure their space supply chains, and partnerships like this are how Australia builds capability that lasts.”
SunDrive’s proprietary direct-copper plating technology replaces silver normally found in solar panels with the more abundant copper, enabling high-efficiency and scalable solar cells with a lower reliance on critical materials.
The company’s ultra-thin and lightweight copper heterojunction (HJT) cells have already set record-breaking results, achieving an efficiency of 26.41 per cent back in 2022.
These factors are crucial in developing components destined for space, where every gram of array mass is a trade against potential payload. Integration with SMC’s Optimus Viper will be the technology’s first spacecraft application.
“SunDrive’s copper HJT technology brings together the ultra-thin, lightweight, and high-efficiency performance needed for next-generation spacecraft solar arrays,” said Vince Allen, co-founder and chief technology officer of SunDrive Solar.
“And applying that to SMC’s Optimus Viper program is a great opportunity to demonstrate what Australian innovation can achieve in the demanding environment of Low Earth Orbit.”
The collaboration between the two companies will see SunDrive lead cell selection, module design, lamination, and electrical characterisation, while SMC will lead substrate design, structural and thermal analysis of the panel, assembly and testing, and mounting the panel on a structural model of Optimus Viper.
The two companies will jointly develop the process for bonding solar modules to the panel substrate.
Testing will go far beyond that which is normal for solar cells, considering that they will be entering one of the toughest environments – space – and must survive the violence of a space launch.
““A solar panel has to survive launch vibration, vacuum and extreme thermal cycling while staying as light as possible,” explained Ian Partis, SMC vice president of engineering.
“Those are exactly the problems our structures, thermal and test teams work on every day.”
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Joshua S. Hill is a Melbourne-based journalist who has been writing about climate change, clean technology, and electric vehicles for over 15 years. He has been reporting on electric vehicles and clean technologies for Renew Economy and The Driven since 2012. His preferred mode of transport is his feet.
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