EnduroSat partners with Bulgarian government on Europe’s Newest Space & Defense Development Center
A memorandum of understanding with the Bulgarian government launches the redevelopment of the 3 million m² former military airbase near Sofia – with the runway restored and extended and the first industrial facilities delivered within three years.
Sofia, Bulgaria – 6 August 2026 – EnduroSat, a European space infrastructure builder, and the Government of Bulgaria have signed a memorandum of understanding to redevelop the former military airbase Dobroslavtsi into Europe’s newest space and defense development center. The 290-hectare site, 15 km from Sofia, will bring together satellite manufacturing, R&D, testing, education, and logistics in one location. Prime Minister Rumen Radev visited the site with the EnduroSat team for the announcement.
EnduroSat’s next generation of satellites is moving from hundreds of kilograms to one to three tons, with solar arrays approaching the wingspan of a Boeing 737. Serial production at this scale – with the supply chains, testing, and logistics behind it – no longer fits within existing facilities. The company’s current 17,500 m² Space Center in Sofia is designed to produce two ESPA-class satellites per day – capacity sized for today’s satellite class, not the next one.
The Dobroslavtsi airbase has stood unused for more than 25 years. The first phase of the program, planned for three years, will restore and extend the runway, deliver the first industrial facilities, and establish a large green area across the site. The center will host full assembly, integration, and testing for the new satellite class, alongside R&D and logistics operations.
The program includes an education campus for the MSc in Space Engineering & Technology, developed with Sofia University, the Air Force Academy, and the Naval Academy. Students will study and build next to operating production lines – extending the model already running at the EnduroSat Space Center.
We’re setting up an unprecedented center bringing together manufacturing, R&D, education, testing, and logistics. It’s complex, risky, and hard – and we’re taking it on anyway.
Raycho Raychev
Founder and CEO, EnduroSat
WHY IT MATTERS:
The center anchors EnduroSat’s infrastructure thesis: the constraint on space services is not satellites alone but the physical capacity underneath them – production floors, test facilities, supply chains, and people. Dobroslavtsi is designed to remove that constraint for the decade ahead.
About EnduroSat
EnduroSat is a space infrastructure builder that engineers, manufactures, and operates high-performance satellites, making space universally accessible for commercial and institutional customers across the globe. EnduroSat delivers end-to-end satellite missions—from mission design and payload integration to launch and in-orbit operations—through a fixed-cost, constellation-as-a-service model.