Director of Commercialisation and Industry Partnership

Description

The European Space Agency is seeking a visionary and accomplished leader to shape Europe’s agenda and future in the global space economy.

As Director of Commercialisation and Industry Partnership, you will be leading ESA commercialisation and business development strategy, with impact on innovation, strategy, and industry. In this unique leadership role, you will act as a catalyst for market development, ensuring that Europe’s space investments translate into sustainable economic value, industrial competitiveness, and strategic advantage for Europe.

You will play a central role in driving the evolution of the European space ecosystem, working closely with top-tier industry leaders, institutional partners and international stakeholders.

The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe's gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe's space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. ESA’s annual budget in 2026 is 8.26 billion Euro.

Duties

Reporting directly to the Director General, you will be a member of the ESA Executive Board, contributing to Agency-wide strategic leadership and decision-making. Under delegation from the Director General, your main responsibilities will include:

Shaping ESA’s Commercialisation vision and strategy:

• define and drive ESA’s commercialisation and business development strategy;
• support the industrialisation and commercialisation of space technologies, products and services;
• enable the development of integrated downstream applications and solutions;
• drive international market expansion for European space companies.

Accelerating industry growth and market development:

• strengthen the position of European industry in the global space economy by enabling international partnerships and supporting the global expansion of European space capabilities;
• foster the scaling-up on global markets;
• facilitate access to private and public investments and finance for European space industry.

Leading major commercial programmes and ensure coordination across ESA directorates:

You will oversee key ESA programmes designed to strengthen commercial competitiveness such as:

• ARTES 4.0 commercial partnership projects conducted in partnership with European and Canadian industries and operators, ensuring that the commercial nature of ARTES is maintained and enhanced;
• ELC (European Launcher Challenge) and Boost! in close cooperation with the Directorate of Space Transportation;
• ACCESS (Accelerating Commercialisation and Competitiveness of European Space Sector) programmes.

You will ensure effective coordination with other programme and elements or projects of commercialisation-related activities across ESA Directorates as required.

You will also promote synergies across programmes to maximise impact and efficiency.

Strengthening partnerships and stakeholders’ engagement:

You will build and maintain close relationships and partnerships with external entities such as Member State delegations, industry (space and non-space), academia, international partners, and stakeholder organisations as required.

Leadership, people management and risk management:

You will actively work to ensure the well-being, motivation, training and career progression of your Directorate workforce, incentivising a spirit of initiative, transparency, information flow and collaboration with other Directorates.

You will also be responsible for identifying, assessing, managing, and reporting the health and safety risks in your area of responsibility.

Technical competencies

Behavioural competencies

Result Orientation
Operational Efficiency
Fostering Cooperation
Relationship Management
Continuous Improvement
Forward Thinking

For more information, please refer to the ESA Core Behavioural Competencies guidebook

Education

A master's is required for this post, either in law or economics, business administration, or in any other technical domain.

Additional requirements

Key qualities required for the post are an innovative spirit and a strategically oriented mind, a proven capacity to lead change and manage people and teams, excellent relationship management and negotiation skills and the ability to influence high-level decisions.

In addition, you should have:

• the ability to provide strategic direction to the individuals and teams and to relate team objectives to the overall, evolving organisational goals and context;
• the ability to drive performance within and across teams throughout the organisation;
• demonstrated excellent leadership, relationship management and communication skills, both oral and written;
• excellent cognitive, analytical, delegation, planning and organisational skills;
• the ability to anticipate problems, solve complex issues and relate situations to their context;
• the ability to reach solution-oriented, pragmatic and timely decisions of a high standard and with integrity as well as to support others (team members, upper management, other stakeholders) in this process.