NordSpace says a new facility shows its readiness to move into “production mode” for sovereign launch in Canada, as it expects to reattempt launching its Taiga test rocket later this year.
The company announced today (June 16) that it has opened a new rocket factory in Markham, Ont., at 75 Clegg Rd., with 60,000 square feet available to produce light-and medium-lift orbital launch vehicles and space systems. NordSpace officials stated that this facility is 10 times larger than the previous headquarters for the company.
CEO Rahul Goel framed the facility as critical not only to NordSpace, but to developing sovereign launch in Canada. “Sovereignty is control, and that requires doing the hard parts first,” he stated. “Manufacturing, talent development, intellectual property, supply chains, test facilities, and more. Lose control or skip the hard parts that make a capability truly sovereign, and you eventually lose control of the capability alltogether.”
The Taiga’s next launch attempt date has not yet been released but the company did offer details on NordSpace’s production plans in the press release.
What Rocket Factory 1 does
The new facility, called Rocket Factory 1 (RF-1), “marks the company’s deliberate transition from several years of research and development to a production-focused industrial company,” NordSpace officials stated in a press release. RF-1 is a Controlled Goods Program with a capacity of 255 employees, and is expected to be “fully operational over the coming months.”
RF-1 will include NordSpace’s Advanced Manufacturing for Aerospace Lab (AMA Lab), Space Systems Lab (SSL), several ISO-class clean rooms, manufacturing (additive, subtractive), test facilities (propulsion, structures and avionics) and a mission control centre. Sample capabilities include:
- Creating two Tundra light-lift (1,100 kilograms to LEO) orbital launch vehicles at the same time, or a single Tundra+ medium lift (2,000 kilograms to LEO). (Scaling up Tundra+ will use a separate facility.) Both rocket lines use NordSpace’s Hadfield-150 liquid-rocket engine, as well as core manufacturing tooling. The first flight units for Hadfield-150 components are in production, NordSpace stated.
- Creating 10 small satellites at the same time using the SSL, which the company says will also build on its Terra Nova dual-use demonstration satellite that will fly on a SpaceX Transporter mission later in 2026. The company also anticipates building larger satellites, which are in the design phase.
- Soon using what NordSpace says will be the “largest known single metal additive manufacturing machine in Canada”, as well as new (unique to Canada) automated fibre-placement machines for “cryogenic-compatible custom composite structures” for capabilities such as building launch vehicles, engines and satellite hardware.
- Using part of RF-1 for Taiga, as “a mechanism to advance internal talent development, launch operations experience, and testing critical technologies for Tundra in-flight.”
“These [RF-1] capabilities are primarily dedicated to NordSpace’s operations, but will selectively be made available to customers looking for advanced capabilities in specialized component production or collaborative research and development,” the company stated, adding this facility work follows on from a previously announced $8 million Canadian consortium led by NordSpace.
Credit: NordSpace
RF-1, added Goel in the statement, “ensures Canada is not left permanently dependent on the priorities and schedules of foreign providers, and is instead the country that exports high-value solutions to its allies.”
NordSpace also plans a larger, 200,000-square-foot facility called Rocket Factory 2 or RF-2. Land has been acquired and this facility will be “dedicated to the development and production of Tempest, the company’s reusable medium-lift orbital launch vehicle.” (Note that Tempest used to be called Titan, and refers to a 5,000+-kg-to-LEO launcher.) Construction is expected to start later this year.
The current facility count by NordSpace is three, including:
- RF-1 in Markham (headquarters, design, engineering, manufacturing, integration, mission control);
- Area 66 in eastern Ontario (a 50-acre propulsion test range, with one engine test cell present and two more under construction this summer);
- The Atlantic Spaceport Complex or ASX, NordSpace’s developing spaceport in Newfoundland and Labrador. ASX has received Government of Canada environmental approval, and the company says construction is continuing on its two space launch complexes at ASX. More launch services agreements related to ASX are expected to be disclosed later in the year.