Tess Space
Autonomous navigation where it matters most
Published online: 11.12.2025
Tess Space
Autonomous navigation where it matters most
Published online: 11.12.2025
By Trine Reinholt Andersen, AAU Technology Transfer Office
Modern operations across defense, security, climate monitoring and critical industrial sectors face rapidly increasing demands for autonomy on the ground. Whether it is border surveillance, infrastructure inspection, or environmental monitoring, missions today require high reliability, scalable situational awareness, and the ability to operate in complex and unpredictable environments.
Traditional robotic systems are often dependent on GPS and limited by rigid control models and, thus, struggle to meet these requirements. At the same time, many of these missions expose human personnel to significant risk. Reducing the number of people injured or killed on the frontline and enabling the delivery of emergency aid and equipment without putting additional lives in danger, are core motivations behind Tess Space’s work.
Space-Grade Autonomy, Built for Earth
Tess Space offers an advanced Autonomous Management System (AMS) for uncrewed ground vehicles (UGVs), developed through years of space robotics research in collaboration with the European Space Agency and Aalborg University.
The AMS integrates intelligent guidance, navigation and control (GNC) algorithms, real-time data collection, and a modular autonomy architecture to deliver fully autonomous navigation and decision-making - even when GPS is unavailable or the environmental conditions are too extreme.
This space-inspired heritage is a major differentiator. Technologies originally developed for lunar and planetary rover missions where robustness, precision and self-reliance are non-negotiable are now applied directly to terrestrial challenges that demand the same level of reliability.
Tess Space at AAU INNOVATE
A PLATFORM DESIGNED FOR REAL OPERATIONAL DEMANDS
Tess Space’s autonomy platform is engineered to meet the realities of demanding field operations with an autonomous management system enabling vehicles to understand and react to their surroundings without human intervention.
The system incorporates strong, hardware-rooted security through trusted platform modules, full-disk AES-256 encryption, and remote-disable capabilities that safeguard mission integrity even if a vehicle is compromised. At the same time, operators gain live situational awareness through continuous data feedback, ensuring they have the insight needed to make informed decisions whenever and wherever conditions change.
AUTONOMY MAKES THE DIFFERENCE
With the reliable ground autonomy platform, Tess Space unlocks mission capabilities in environments where conventional robotic systems often would fail. In border control and defense operations, GPS-independent navigation allows UGVs to function in remote, contested, or low-visibility areas where precision and persistence are essential. In these settings, autonomous vehicles can take on tasks that would otherwise place personnel directly in harm’s way - helping reduce frontline injuries and casualties.
Critical infrastructure operators can deploy autonomous patrols and inspections in hazardous or restricted zones, enhancing safety while reducing manual workload. Environmental and climate monitoring efforts benefit from vehicles capable of traversing rugged terrain to collect data that would otherwise be difficult or dangerous to obtain.
The same capabilities also support humanitarian and logistics missions, enabling the safe delivery of emergency supplies, equipment, and medical kits in disaster-hit regions, active conflict zones, or unstable terrain, without endangering additional responders. Industrial sectors such as mining and construction likewise gain efficiency and safety through autonomous off-road mobility in demanding operational settings.
FROM SANDBOX TO REAL-WORLD OPERATIONS
Tess Space operates at the intersection of three rapidly growing markets: unmanned systems, security and defense, and AI-powered autonomy. After years of development and testing in controlled environments, the two founders of Tess Space, CEO and Associate Professor at Aalborg University, Simon Bøgh, and CTO and PhD, Anton Bjørndahl Mortensen, is now moving the capabilities towards real operational settings.
In 2025, Tess Space was incubated in the ESA Business Incubation Centre at Aalborg University and supported with €60.000, followed by a DKK 50.000 grant from Norlys Vækstpulje.
Throughout the journey, the AAU Technology Transfer Office has supported the team with sparring and guidance on the development of the company's business model, pitch training, funding opportunities, and networks that have created matches with external parties and the industry.