GMV to Enhance Collision Avoidance Capabilities with New ESA-Funded Project

The COLA-LARGE project, a key initiative under ESA's Zero Debris Approach, officially kicks off with GMV joining the consortium led by Maity Space, marking a new step in the evolution of collision avoidance capabilities and space traffic coordination in Europe.

The COLA-LARGE project (COLA – Large Upgrade of Operational Toolchain) addresses the growing need for improved collision avoidance infrastructure amid escalating orbital congestion and the increasing number of close approach alerts. Funded by the European Space Agency (ESA), the initiative aims to significantly enhance the resilience and automation of satellite conjunction management services.

At the heart of this effort is the COLA operational toolchain, the infrastructure developed and maintained by ESA to provide 24/7 collision avoidance services to its own and third-party partner. It encompasses the ColaFW back-end for computing collision risks, the SCARF front-end interface for operator interaction, and the DISCOS database which stores and manages information on space object characteristics such as size. This toolchain ensures ESA missions comply with its space debris mitigation policies adopted as a benchmark for best practices by the wider satellite operator community.

GMV plays a central role in this new venture, contributing its extensive experience and cutting-edge capabilities in operational toolchain upgrades, especially in relation to the DISCOS system, CDM 2.0 support, hard-body radius estimation, object size analysis, and multi-source data integration. These components are essential to supporting more efficient risk assessments and collision avoidance manoeuvres, while facilitating seamless adoption of the upcoming CDM 2.0 data standard.

The consortium is led by Maity Space and includes GMV through its subsidiary in Poland. The Polish branch of GMV contributes to this initiative with its proven track record in SSA/SST domains and advanced software engineering capabilities.

The COLA-LARGE project will develop advanced methods for processing increasingly complex shape and attitude data for space objects, improve automation across interfaces with various data providers like EUSST, TraCSS and LeoLabs, and introduce scalable methods for accurate object status identification and manoeuvrability analysis.

With this award, GMV reaffirms its position as a trusted partner in the development of critical SSA/SST infrastructure in Europe. The activity, which includes development, integration, and validation phases, will be carried out in close cooperation with ESA and the other consortium members over the next few years.

This achievement reflects GMV’s long-standing commitment to safe and sustainable space operations and aligns with Europe’s broader goal of achieving Zero Debris by 2030.