The members of the Administrative Board of the European GNSS Agency (GSA), the future EU Space Programme Agency, elected Rodrigo da Costa of Portugal as the agency’s new Executive Director on Tuesday 15 September, succeeding Pascal Claudel of France.
Mr da Costa obtained the unanimous vote of the Administrative Board (composed of one representative per Member State, four representatives of the European Commission, and one non-voting representative appointed by the European Parliament), with the exception of two States which were absent. His term of office will last 5 years, extendable for a further 4 years.
He was the only candidate listed by the European Commission, in compliance with the regulation (512/2014) establishing the GSA (art. 15), which does not mention a minimum number of candidates, we were told by a European official.
Mr da Costa holds a degree in aerospace engineering from the Instituto Superior Tecnico in Lisbon and has been Director of the Galileo Services Programme since March 2017. Prior to joining GSA, he held several positions at Airbus Defence and Space in project management, business development, and large institutional accounts in the space industry, human spaceflight, exploration, launchers and R&D. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)