ESA awards Sivers beamforming contract
Sivers Semiconductors has been awarded a new development program by the European Space Agency (ESA). The contract, valued at approximately $900,000, will span 18 months and support the development of next-generation satellite communication (SATCOM) beamforming integrated circuits (BFICs).
“As the only EU-based commercial provider of mmWave BFICs for SATCOM and 5G, this award reinforces our position as a key player in the European SATCOM ecosystem,” said Vickram Vathulya, CEO of Sivers Semiconductors. “It enables us to push the boundaries of BFIC performance while meeting critical energy-efficiency requirements, positioning Sivers to deliver both our upcoming products and the next-generation solutions the market will demand.”
The ESA’s initiative will advance broad-market SATCOM BFICs targeting superior performance and improved energy efficiency. This builds on Sivers Semiconductors’ technology roadmap, with the company’s current generation of SATCOM BFICs scheduled for broad release in Q1 2026.
"Being selected for this ESA program highlights Sivers’ commitment to advancing Europe’s SATCOM innovation,” said Harish Krishnaswamy, managing director of the wireless business unit at Sivers Semiconductors. “We are proud to contribute to ESA’s mission and support strategic initiatives like IRIS2, which are crucial to establishing a robust SATCOM network for the European Union.”
“Phased arrays have become essential to modern SATCOM, and semiconductor advances have finally made them broadly affordable. Yet beamforming networks in today’s user terminals remain too complex and power-hungry, limiting true scalability,” said Václav Valenta ESA's directorate of technology, engineering and quality. “This new ESA project tackles that challenge head-on by exploring smarter combinations of active and passive beamforming architectures and antenna-feeding mechanisms, designed to enable a new generation of significantly more efficient phased arrays. We are very pleased to launch this strategic development with Sivers Semiconductors, who plays a key role in the global phased-array supply chain.
