Journal article 2026
Acta Astronautica Vol. 238, Part A · pp. 332–340
The Space Economy is creating opportunities and new forms of risk at the same time, making the risk landscape more interconnected and increasing the need for risk management at both mission and business levels.
The Space Economy is changing through new technologies, business models, private actors and regulatory arrangements. These developments can mitigate some traditional space risks while creating or amplifying others. This research develops a systematic framework for understanding that evolving risk landscape, distinguishing mission risks from business risks and mapping how major Space Economy trends influence them. The goal is to help space organizations move from static risk lists toward a more dynamic view of risk exposure.
How can the mission and business risks faced by space companies under the New Space paradigm be classified?
How can the main risk drivers and their dependencies under the New Space paradigm be modelled?
What are the drivers of mutual influence between mission and business risks and the major trends in the Space Economy?
The study combines a systematic review of 147 scientific and technical documents with expert validation. It develops a hierarchical taxonomy of 36 mission and business risks, identifies five major Space Economy trends divided into 25 sub-trends, and builds bow-tie models linking risk events to causes, consequences and impacts. Six space and risk experts validate the taxonomies and models, while a trend-risk matrix combines evidence from the literature and expert judgement to map relationships and risk interdependencies.
Across the mapped relationships, 69.7% are expected to increase mission or business risk, while 30.3% have a mitigating effect. Market liberalization, the predominance of private space companies and space tourism account for a substantial share of the risk-increasing relationships.
Public-private partnerships, space-system insurance and on-orbit servicing account for more than half of the identified positive influences. This shows that Space Economy transformation is not uniformly risk-increasing and that governance and service innovations can also strengthen resilience.
The trend-risk matrix reveals escalating and mitigating influences together with interdependencies among risks. The study also identifies areas where scientific evidence and expert agreement remain incomplete, particularly around new organizational models, technologies and their effects on business risk.
The study provides a more comprehensive and better-grounded basis for modelling mission and business risk in the New Space environment. By combining taxonomies, bow-tie models and a trend-risk matrix, it moves risk analysis beyond isolated events toward relationships among technological, business and regulatory change.
Space organizations can use the framework when planning missions, validating business models and strengthening risk-management capabilities. Insurers can use the same logic to improve risk analysis for space infrastructure, while researchers can extend the framework to new architectures, services, regulations and governance models.
Trucco, P., Paravano, A., & Locatelli, G. (2026). Framing the dynamics of risk landscape amidst space economy trends. Acta Astronautica, 238, 332–340. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actaastro.2025.06.067
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