ASTRAIOS is an EU Horizon Europe project to identify the existing space-related education and training across Europe, project future demand for space skills from the European space industry, and identify actions to align and improve the career pathways into the sector.
ASTRAIOS started in January 2023 and will finish December 2025. It is being delivered by a consortium of 10 partners from across the EU and UK, including Space Skills Alliance.
Visit the ASTRAIOS website for more information.
Deliverable 1.2: Developing a European Taxonomy of Space Knowledge (EU-TaSK)
The rapid evolution of the space sector, marked by the constant emergence of new businesses, models, and technologies, creates a complex landscape for education and training.
We have designed a knowledge taxonomy, EU-TaSK, designed to make sense of the space education landscape as identified by Deliverable 1.1. EU-TaSK provides a common vocabulary and structure that makes it easier to collect, analyse, and share space education information and data, and to harmonise and compare data from different institutions and sources. It covers the upstream, midstream, downstream, and supporting areas.
EU-TaSK is built on the knowledge domains and knowledge areas identified in the analysis of 140 space-related degrees across Europe, and aligned with SpaceCRAFT, EO Taxonomy, and PwC space value chain. EU-TaSK is also mapped to ESCO, and we identify that space systems engineering and other space-related engineering knowledge areas are currently missing from ESCO.
Deliverable 1.3: EU Space Sector Demographics Report and Database
To date, much of the data on the space workforce has been collected from surveys of companies and individuals. We take a new approach to data collection, providing an overview of the European space workforce using data collected from LinkedIn’s Talent Insights tool.
Our report uncovers trends within this data, including the geography, educational background, skills, and flow of talent. The data presented here builds on Deliverables 1.1 and 1.2 and will be used in future work packages of the ASTRAIOS project, and can be used by the wider sector to identify emerging skills challenges, characterise the typical space career pathway, and shape curricula.
Other work within ASTRAIOS
We are supporting work on other deliverables during 2024/25, including:
- D1.1 Structured data set of HEIs and other institutions/organisations and offered space-relevant curricula/courses
- D1.2 Applications, services and supporting technologies
- D2.3 Space Sector Soft Skills Report
- D2.5 European boot camp to bring European students/entrepreneurs together and be trained in transferable training skills
- D3.1 Analysis report of skills demand and capabilities across sector
- D3.3 Analysis report of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Issues
- D3.4 Mentoring virtual programme established across Europe focusing on addressing EDI issues
- D4.1 Student and EU-University outreach report
Funded by the European Union
ASTRAIOS is funded by the European Union, under Grant Agreement No. 101082636. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Health and Digital Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.
