The Story of Astar.

I wanted to take on a new challenge. I wished to be able to build a model rocket that would be capable of reaching the edge of space, before coming back down, and landing under its own power.

The vehicle I would build for this was called the A-1. Little did I know, the A-1 would take over my life.

Admittedly, when I started this hobby, I had no clue what I was doing. I'm an IT student, so I could probably get a grasp of how flight software works, and I'm an avid fan of everything rocketry-related. But I'm in no way a rocket scientist or engineer, capable of building a rocket from scratch.

But my first prototype allowed me to learn a lot about the concept, and for Mk2, my second prototype, I switched to 3D printing, as it would allow me to make changes quicker, and have a more customizable platform.

About this time, I started learning more and more about how rockets

actually

worked, when something clicked. I started to wonder if this idea could have potential as an actual business.

One thing was certain. If I wanted to do this, I had to make sure he had an actually good idea. And over the next few months, I'd get closer and closer to it.

Starting in April 2024, I had been working on the A-1 for 14 months, and the inexperienced hobbyist I was in the early days had turned into someone who was actually capable of delivering something.

At this time, my idea started to truly take shape.

What if I made a suborbital rocket tailored to research?

It would be challenging for sure, but with the right plan, I was sure I could do it.

By now, it was time to launch. I had been working on the A-1 for a year and a half, and I was mere weeks away from actually launching it. The big moment, time to prove to the world what the A-1 could do.

The vehicle that would fly the mission, Mk3, was a barebones prototype, but it was a design that would allow me to verify if the concept was right. And that's what Astar is all about, we test at the model scale, and verify concepts early on. And now, the time has come.

This was a make-or-break moment for Astar. Were this launch to fail, there was a real chance the project would have been canned right there and then. Luckily for Astar, everything went as planned, and TF-1 was a success!

The success of TF-1 gave me the courage and motivation to make the next step in Astar's journey. It was time to try and make a company out of it.

This is where Astar is at at present. I enrolled in Start Academy, a Flemish competition for students with a business idea.

The main goal of the program is to figure out whether or not a business idea is feasible, and how the most can be made of it.

At this point in time, I was mostly busy with the business side of the story. Start Academy is quite an information-heavy competition, so that logically had my full focus.

Out of about 80-ish submissions, my pitch was chosen as one of the final 12 to go to the semi-finals.

At said semi-finals, I got eliminated, which is a bummer, but looking at it from the bright side, Astar made it to the semi-finals, which means that, as an idea, it's actually not bad.

The future is looking bright for Astar. Vehicle 4, our next A-1 vehicle, is being designed, and is scheduled to fly in August 2025.

With each test, with each flight, we learn more and more about the platform we've built, to one day make our ambitions come true. We strongly want to thank everyone who watched us grow into what we are now.