Aude Vignelles is the Director of Vignelles Space, providing expert professional services and solutions for space governments and industries across all aspects of space programs. Until April 2024, Aude served as the inaugural Chief Technology Officer of the Australian Space Agency, where she was instrumental in developing the civil space strategy’s technical roadmaps, scoping and managing the Agency’s space programs and delivering on domestic and international activities. She brought extensive knowledge of the national and international space industry, along with program management expertise and a breadth of space science and systems engineering skills. Prior to this role, Aude was the Executive Manager of Satellite & Fixed Wireless Operations at NBN.

Aude is a space and aeronautics engineer, graduating from ENSICA (now ISAE-SUPAERO) in Toulouse, and began her career at the European Space Agency (ESA) in the Netherlands. She became a key expert in the test campaigns of scientific programs, including the Rosetta mission, and was appointed Test Manager for the X-ray Multi-Mirror Mission (XMM), ESA’s largest scientific space program at the time.

She then moved to London where she started a career in the broadcast industry and successfully integrated the first digital terrestrial broadcast centre in the world (ONdigital). She continued in this field in Australia with Foxtel and Austar, and later became Vice President of Technicolor, overseeing all programs in the APAC region.

Having lived in Australia for the past 23 years, Aude has significantly contributed to the Australian space community and the establishment of the Australian Space Agency through White Papers, conference events, collaboration with the growing start-up community, and promoting Women in Space and Engineering at universities.