The National Institute for Aerospace Technology "Esteban Terradas" ( or INTA) is an autonomous agency of the Spanish public administration dependent on the Secretariat of State for Defence (SEDEF). It is responsible for the aerospace, aeronautics, hydrodynamics, and defense and security technologies research. The INTA was established in 1942, as the National Institute of Aeronautical Technology (Instituto Nacional de Técnica Aeronáutica), and it was integrated in the Ministry of the Air. It has its headquarters in Torrejón de Ardoz, near Madrid.

Organization

Its budget, €190 million in 2019, comes from the Spanish Ministry of Defence and from its own projects with the industry. In 2001, it had 1153 R&D staff with 325 full-time equivalent researchers. As of 2017, INTA had a total of 1500 employees, 80% of them are dedicated to R&D activities. Its two main areas of activity are research and development (for example, in propulsion, materials, remote sensing) and certification and testing (for example, in aircraft, software, metrology).

Programs and missions

Satellites

Main objectives of the Nano-satellites and Mini-satellites programmes; Satellite programmes: All these satellites are totally Spanish in manufacture and design, comprising a low-cost multiuse platform, with modular design subsystems and standard interfaces with the payload module.

Launchers

INTA designed sounding and orbital rockets such as: These operated from the El Arenosillo rocket launch site.

Aircraft

Instruments

Other projects

Facilities

This is an incomplete list of facilities:

Technological campuses

Testing facilities

Tracking and launch sites

Other facilities