ISOS Pilot Mission Coordination & Support Action

Specific conditions
Expected EU contribution per project	The Commission estimates that an EU contribution of between EUR 2.00 and 2.50 million would allow these outcomes to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of a proposal requesting different amounts.
Indicative budget	The total indicative budget for the topic is EUR 2.50 million.
Type of Action	Coordination and Support Actions
Admissibility conditions	The conditions are described in General Annex A. The following exceptions apply: The page limit of the application is 60 pages.
Eligibility conditions	The conditions are described in General Annex B. The following exceptions apply: In order to achieve the expected outcomes, and safeguard the Union’s strategic assets, interests, autonomy, or security, participation is limited to legal entities established in Member States and the following associated countries: Norway and Iceland. Proposals including entities established in countries outside the scope specified in the call/topic/action will be ineligible. For the duly justified and exceptional reasons listed in the paragraph above, in order to guarantee the protection of the strategic interests of the Union and its Member States, entities established in an eligible country listed above, but which are directly or indirectly controlled by a non-eligible country or by a non-eligible country entity, may not participate in the action unless it can be demonstrated, by means of guarantees approved by the eligible country of establishment, that their participation to the action would not negatively impact the Union’s strategic, assets, interests, autonomy, or security. The guarantees shall in particular substantiate that, for the purpose of the action, measures are in place to ensure that: a) control over the applicant legal entity is not exercised in a manner that restrains or restricts its ability to carry out the action and to deliver results, that imposes restrictions concerning its infrastructure, facilities, assets, resources, intellectual property or know-how needed for the purpose of the action, or that undermines its capabilities and standards necessary to carry out the action; b) access by a non-eligible country or by a non-eligible country entity to sensitive information relating to the action is prevented; and the employees or other persons involved in the action have a national security clearance issued by an eligible country, where appropriate; c) ownership of the intellectual property arising from, and the results of, the action remain within the recipient during and after completion of the action, are not subject to control or restrictions by non-eligible countries or non-eligible country entity, and are not exported outside the eligible countries, nor is access to them from outside the eligible countries granted, without the approval of the eligible country in which the legal entity is established. If projects use satellite-based earth observation, positioning, navigation and/or related timing data and services, beneficiaries must make use of Copernicus and/or Galileo/EGNOS (other data and services may additionally be used).
Procedure	The procedure is described in General Annex F. The following exceptions apply: The granting authority can fund a maximum of one project.
Legal and financial set-up of the Grant Agreements	The rules are described in General Annex G. The following exceptions apply: Eligible costs will take the form of a lump sum as defined in the Decision of 7 July 2021 authorising the use of lump sum contributions under the Horizon Europe Programme – the Framework Programme for Research and Innovation (2021-2027) – and in actions under the Research and Training Programme of the European Atomic Energy Community (2021-2025). [[This decision is available on the Funding and Tenders Portal, in the reference documents section for Horizon Europe, under ‘Simplified costs decisions’ or through this link: https://ec.europa.eu/info/funding-tenders/opportunities/docs/2021-2027/horizon/guidance/ls-decision_he_en.pdf]].
Security Sensitive Topics	Some activities resulting from this topic may involve using classified background and/or producing of security sensitive results (EUCI and SEN). Please refer to the related provisions in section B Security — EU classified and sensitive information of the General Annexes.

Expected Outcome: The strategic objective of this topic is to support the development of capabilities to ‘Act in Space’ through demonstrating in space a pilot mission by 2030 related to In-Space Operations and Services (ISOS). The envisaged ISOS pilot mission shall provide the necessary seed components for a service infrastructure, available to the European in-space ecosystem (including the EU assets), driving the generation of a new in-space economy, providing enhanced in-orbit technology demonstration and maximising EU technology non-dependence.

This pilot mission will largely contribute to ensure EU’s freedom of action in space, increase the resilience and protection of EU assets in space and foster the development of the new in-space economy. A pioneering, novel and scalable mission concept, which is unique compared to other initiatives among all space-faring nations is envisaged. The mission will build on previous R&I with an operational mission concept, focusing on application and service demonstration, with a concrete view to commercial and governmental usage. The detailed mission concept will be derived in close coordination with EU Member States and EEA countries through a dedicated ISOS Pilot Mission Advisory Group (PMAG)¹⁶¹.

This Coordination and Support Action addresses the coordination of the development R&I actions for the implementation of the ISOS pilot mission and the support of its evolution towards a flagship for commercial and governmental services.

The project is expected to contribute to the following outcomes, in close and continuous coordination with the European Commission services and the ISOS Pilot Mission Advisory Group¹⁶¹:

Creating and promoting an inclusive, transparent and scalable ISOS ecosystem that allows on-boarding of governmental or commercial actors’ initiatives putting Europe at the centre of a new in-space economy offering global in-space services;
Contribution to the ISOS Pilot Mission Objectives provided in the technical annex¹⁶³;
Elaboration of the ISOS Pilot mission detailed architecture, based on the high-level mission requirements provided in the technical annex¹⁶³;
Coordination of the implementation of the four components identified in topics HORIZON-CL4-2025-02-SPACE-21/22/23/24, in particular with regards to the determination of interfaces among the mission components, identification of dependencies, exchange of requirements and performance indicators;
Support to the elaboration of key standards for future institutional and commercial ISOS missions together with the projects implementing the four mission components and other relevant stakeholders;
Ensuring the availability of results to the next mission phases.

This topic will contribute to, in the medium to long term, developing, deploying global space-based services and contribute to fostering the European space sector competitiveness, as stated in the expected impact of this destination.

Scope: To tackle the above expected outcomes, the following R&I actions must be addressed taking into account the provided technical annex¹⁶³:

Overall coordination of the ISOS pilot mission preparation up to detailed design¹⁶⁴ and elaboration of a mission deployment plan and detailed system architecture that is modular and scalable, in close cooperation with all mission components and in continuous coordination and under the supervision of the PMAG;
Ensure interoperability and compatibility between mission components (for instance interfaces among components and exchange of requirements and performance indicators);
Perform mission minimum cost estimate and cost impact assessment for new plug-ins (mission components, service demonstrations, technologies, etc.) to the mission and system in coordination with the PMAG;
Elaboration of an effective conflict resolution regime;
Setup and management of a key technology and service provider group (TSPG) that will be composed of selected future beneficiaries of the four mission components identified in topics HORIZON-CL4-2025-02-SPACE-21/22/23/24. The group composition is expected to consider and contribute to a balanced provision of Member States’ countries expertise and capabilities to the overall ISOS pilot mission. This group should be integrated in the decision-making processes of the CSA;
Dissemination and Communication activities on the ISOS pilot mission, including the creation of a professional video to visualise and promote the ISOS pilot mission;
Derive an in-space services product tree – functional specification of the pilot mission system;
Community consultation and preparation of a proposal for a Pilot Mission and Future Space Ecosystem Plug-in Specification which should allow third-party on-boarding the ISOS pilot mission ecosystem, at system and technology level;
Proposal for a pilot mission evolution plan towards a flagship for commercial and governmental services (seed point for future flagship development and deployment plan, to be considered as future component of the EU Space Programme). The project should propose at least three use cases for the servicing of EU flagship assets through the delivery of a concept of operations (CONOPS);
Contribution to standardisation, regulatory and legal framework actions including stakeholder consultation;
System risk management plan: identification of global risks, incl. technical, operational, managerial, legal, IP, and related to external interferences, and elaboration of possible mitigation actions.

The project is expected to collaborate with those selected under topics HORIZON-CL4-2025-02-SPACE-21, 22, 23, 24, in order to ensure interoperability and the necessary and sufficient documentation and information sharing for the implementation of the Pilot Mission, to make economies of scale in sharing best practices, defining common processes for addressing the different challenges, ensuring efficient monitoring and review, organising dissemination and communication activities, etc. Such collaboration among all those projects will be formalised by a collaboration agreement.

Indicative timetable: publication in Q4 of 2025.

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