Given the disappointing number of orders placed with satellite manufacturers so far this year, European launch provider Arianespace is bracing itself for a smaller launch market next year, according to CEO Jean-Yves Le Gall.

The market leader, Arianespace won eight of 17 competed launch contracts in 2003, managing to post a modest profit for that year after three straight years of losses.

The company has won five of 10 launch contract competitions so far in 2004, but expects only another one to three more competitions before the year is out. These up-and-down cycles have been typical of the past few years, according to Arianespace Inc. President Clayton Mowry.

To make up for the losses of 2000-2002, Arianespace has reorganized and downsized to 250 employees. Le Gall said he believes the workforce will remain stable, but said the company must be "open" to further adjustments as the market requires.

"Our credo is to adapt to the market need," Le Gall told The DAILY in an interview Aug. 6. "That's exactly what we're doing in terms of a strategy with our family of launch vehicles, [and] exactly what we are doing in terms of restructuring and downsizing in order to decrease our prices."

In another measure to put the company on better footing, Arianespace's European shareholders plan to inject more capital into the company by the end of the year. The amount still is being debated, Le Gall said.

One of the company's major shareholders is aerospace giant European Aeronautic Defence and Space (EADS) Co., which owns nearly a third of Arianespace. According to Aerospace Daily affiliate Aviation Week & Space Technology, EADS hopes to gain a larger share of control over Arianespace after the French space agency CNES reduces its stake in the company.

The prospect doesn't worry Le Gall. EADS already "plays a very important role in the management of the company, and in my opinion, if EADS increases its share, it will not change anything in the management of the company," he said.

Flexible flyers

Arianespace offers launches on the Ariane 5 rocket from its spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, and has an agreement with Boeing Launch Services to provide backup launch capability onboard the Zenit 3SL rocket from Boeing's Sea Launch equatorial platform. Starting in 2007, Arianespace also plans to offer launches on Russian Soyuz vehicles and smaller Vega rockets. Despite the current soft market, Le Gall said he is confident about his company's position

"We are coming from a company which five years ago used to market just Ariane 4, to a company that is marketing today a whole family of launch vehicles," Le Gall said. "We can send any mass to any orbit, and we are the only launch services company having this capability."

The company is focusing much of its attention on the upcoming requalification flight of the 10-ton Ariane 5 ECA, which is scheduled for late October. The first flight attempt by the ECA, which the company plans to make its workhorse launcher, failed in December 2002.

Although intended as a test flight, the mission will carry a commercial customer, flying at a discount - Spain's XTAR X-band communications satellite, built by Loral Space & Communications. The rocket also will carry a test satellite produced for the European Space Agency (ESA). A second qualification flight is planned for next spring.

The company plans to phase out the older Ariane 5G ("generic") rocket after several successful flights by the ECA variant. The company also is producing the Ariane 5ES, a blend of the two that features the ECA's Vulcain 2 main engine but not its cryogenic upper stage.

Meanwhile, construction of a $350 million launch pad for the Soyuz is underway in Kourou, in support of a first flight in 2007. The company plans two to four Soyuz launches from Kourou each year.