Flight-ready hardware has already cleared engineering tests and is now progressing through Boeing’s standard qualification process ahead of its first customer missions.
“Power sets the pace of a mission,” said Michelle Parker, vice-president of Boeing Space Mission Systems. “By drawing on expertise across the company, we’ve introduced efficiencies and new technologies to accelerate production. Combining Boeing’s additive manufacturing capabilities with Spectrolab’s high-efficiency solar cells and Millennium’s high-rate production, we’re turning speed into a capability – giving customers the chance to deploy resilient constellations faster.”
The first 3D-printed solar arrays will carry Spectrolab solar cells aboard small satellites built by Millennium Space Systems. Both companies sit under Boeing’s Space Mission Systems business.
Unlike conventional methods, Boeing’s approach allows the entire solar array to be built in parallel. Each printed panel includes embedded harness paths and attachment points, replacing dozens of individual components and complex bonding steps with a single rigid, precise structure that is faster to produce and easier to integrate.
Melissa Orme, Boeing’s vice-president of materials and structures, said the work reflects a broader enterprise push into additive manufacturing. “We’re not just taking time and cost out, we’re putting performance in. Qualified materials, a digital design thread and high-rate production let us lighten structures, develop new designs and repeat those successes across programs. That’s the strength of enterprise additive, it delivers better parts today and the capacity to scale tomorrow.”
Boeing has already incorporated more than 150,000 3D-printed parts across its product lines, including over 1,000 radio frequency components on each Wideband Global SATCOM satellite and fully printed structures in several small satellite ranges.
The new solar array technology is designed to scale from small satellites through to larger platforms such as the Boeing 702 class spacecraft, with commercial availability expected from 2026. Robot-assisted assembly and automated inspections at Spectrolab are also set to reduce hand-offs, further improving speed and consistency.