Training

The SME Office organises and supports various training courses for SMEs. Subjects covered take account of requests from SMEs, as well as the availability of ESA experts capable of delivering state-of-the-art knowledge and know-how. Where appropriate, organisations external to ESA are also engaged as a complementary source of expertise.

In addition to the training courses organised by the SME Office, from time to time bespoke training for industry of interest to SMEs is set up by other ESA departments. An excerpt from the Course Catalogue is provided below.

TRAINING OPPORTUNITIES

Visit ESA's Learning hub to find out about courses on offer and to register. 

Course descriptions

R&D proposal writing training for SMEs (3 days)

The course “How to write a good proposal in response to an ESA Invitation to Tender for R&D activities” comprises a series of presentations by senior ESA staff from the Agency's Technical Services and from the Contracts Department, followed by a hands-on exercise where an ESA Invitation to Tender (ITT) is distributed to four teams. These teams are asked to write a "real" proposal in response to the training ITT. The proposals submitted during this training session are subsequently evaluated by ESA instructors and discussed publicly in a very realistic simulation of an ESA Tender Evaluation Board (TEB).

As the ITT does not require specialist scientific or technical knowledge, the course is suitable for participants with both technical and commercial/managerial backgrounds.

Product Assurance in ESA projects (2 days)

This two-day course aims at providing participants with an overview of the Product Assurance (PA) tasks to be performed throughout a project. It explains how Product Assurance is implemented in ESA projects and provides practical examples of how PA is involved in projects.

Presentations on day 1 provide a generic overview of Product Assurance tasks and introduce the different PA disciplines in ESA projects. The topics of Dependability and Safety are discussed in this part.

Day 2 includes lectures on EEE components, Space Radiation Environment and Radiation Hardness Assurance, Materials and Processes, Electronics Assemblies, Printed Circuit Boards (PCB), Electronics Assemblies and Soldering Processes, Materials and Space Environmental Effects as well as Cleanliness and Contamination Control. In addition, the topics of Quality Assurance during Manufacturing and Test of Space Hardware as well as Standardisation and Supply Chain Management as contributors to mission success are addressed.

This course is of particular interest to participants from Small and Medium-sized Enterprises who have a limited knowledge of PA activities in the space sector. It is targeted at participants working for SMEs in ESA Member States, Associate States or Collaborating States who are providing or are intending to provide products for space. The course focuses on hardware-related aspects. Software is dealt with in a separate course.

Software Product Assurance (1 day)

Product Assurance (PA) is the discipline devoted to the study, planning and implementation of activities intended to assure that the design, controls, methods and techniques in a project result in a satisfactory degree of quality in a product.

This 1-day session aims at providing participants with an overview of the Software Product Assurance tasks to be performed throughout a project. It introduces aspects of a Software Product Assurance programme and how Software PA is implemented in projects. 

ESA Software Product Assurance experts guide attendees through four main sessions:

1.    Software in the Context of Space Projects

2.    Software Product Assurance Organisational Aspects / Software RAMS

3.    Product Assurance in the Software Life Cycle / Software Product Assurance challenges

4.    Software Product Assurance Across Processes

Practical exercises complement the training.

This course is of particular interest to SMEs which have the intention to develop software for ESA or in the wider space context. It is targeted at participants working for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises in ESA Member States, Associate States or Cooperating States.

Although no previous software experience is required, it is recommended to have some background in Software Engineering when attending the course.

EEE components procurement: different cost areas and their relevance (1 day)

The main goal of this one-day course is to provide attendees with a good understanding of the pitfalls associated with EEE components procurement and associated costs. The sessions highlight the kind of impact EEE procurement can have on the initially foreseen project budget and schedule.

The course is targeted at engineers and scientists working for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises who wish to have an insight into the different costs areas that need to be considered when working on a project. The course is aimed at both SMEs providing flight products for major satellite programmes as well as companies working at lower TRL levels in technology programmes.

Doing Business with ESA (1 hour, webinar)

This webinar is targeted at newcomers and companies new to ESA that wish to do business with the European Space Agency in the future.

The main objectives of the session are to:

• understand ESA's main operating principles and basic institutional set up
• learn about the Agency's procurement principles and procedures
• get to know the Agency's Procurement tools
• learn about ESA's Industrial Policy
• learn how to sign up as a tenderer and access Invitations to Tender
• be introduced to the Agency's SME Initiative 

Compliant Industrial Rates for ESA Projects (2 hours, webinar)

During the webinar on "Compliant Industrial Rates for ESA Projects", participants learn how to calculate hourly rates and overheads in line with ESA guidelines. In addition, attendees learn how rates are linked to and used in PSS forms which companies must complete in order to participate in an ESA Invitation to Tender (ITT).

The session is targeted at Financial Managers and Project Controllers of industrial entities, especially Small and Medium-sized Enterprises, working or wanting to work with ESA.

Compliant PSS-A Forms for ESA Projects (2 hours, webinar)

A company participating in an ESA Invitation To Tender (ITT) is required to complete a financial proposal that includes the ESA Procedures, Specification and Standards Forms – known as PSS forms.

ESA PSS forms show cost data and are required under the General Conditions of Tender for ESA Contracts (ESA/REG/001, rev.5, Annex IV).

The Tender Evaluation Board (TEB) uses this information to conduct a review, comparison and selection from the various tenders received in response to an ITT. The information in the PSS tables is used to break down costs and give transparency to the total price of an industrial proposal.

The aim of the course is to help participants better understand the PSS forms, enabling them to construct a coherent financial proposal. For those new to ESA, the course gives an introduction to the PSS terminology and demonstrates the links between the costing forms.

IPR in early ESA Technology Development activities (2 hours, webinar)

During the webinar, which is targeted at Small and Medium-sized Enterprises, the fundamental principles of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) are discussed and how ESA deals with IPR in its early technology development activities. The trainer will share some practical examples of IPR from everyday life and how to protect them, and will provide aspects of ESA's legal basis for dealing with the IPRs and what to be aware of when reading ESA's Invitation to Tenders and its draft contracts.

Webinar with ESA’s Industrial Ombudsman (2 hours, webinar)

During the webinar, which is targeted at Small and Medium-sized Enterprises, the Ombudsman (IOE) informs the community about the IOE's role and competences and shares some lessons learned from past cases with SMEs. Attendees learn in which cases the Ombudsman can intervene, how to call for support, but also when the IOE cannot provide advice.

ECSS (webinars)

Webinars on the various disciplines of the European Cooperation for Space Standardization (ECSS) are offered on a biennial basis. Recordings of past sessions in the M, E and Q-branches of ECSS are available as e-learning modules on the ESA Learning Hub: https://learninghub.esa.int/e-learning

Participants are advised that the presentations used during the training sessions can be downloaded at: http://ecss.nl/ecss-training-material-for-download/ (log-in/registration to the page required).