Ignacio Belieres Montero

iProUP’s 2023 profile says that he was obsessed with rockets from the age of 12. In 2011, as a first-year student at the Instituto Libre de Segunda Enseñanza (ILSE), he watched from his classroom the orbital launch and recovery of SpaceXSpaceXSpaceX is a company founded by Elon Musk in 2002 whose businesses include space transportation, Starlink satellite communications and artificial intelligence. It went public in 2026 under the ticker SPCX.Open the full entry’s Dragon; when he shared with a teacher his wish to create an aerospace company, the teacher laughed, replied “Usted va a ir a Silicon Valley” (You are going to go to Silicon Valley) and wished him luck. As a teenager he experimented on a rooftop terrace with engines and fuels that he designed after intensive research on the internet.⁠[1]

iProUP writes that Emiliano Kargieman was then developing the prototype of the CubeBug-1 nanosatellite, which was launched on April 26, 2013; he regarded Kargieman as a role model, and after visiting him he reflected: “Si se está haciendo acá, todo el mundo lo va a hacer” (If it is being done here, everyone is going to do it). In March 2014 Vladimir Putin signed the annexation of Crimea, and satellite companies soon lost the launch transport provided by the Russian–Ukrainian consortium Kosmotras; the news led him to start thinking about orbital transport.⁠[1]

iProUP writes that as early as 2015 he set himself a plan: “tengo que diseñar el cohete en 3D, armar el plan de negocios e ir a la Universidad Stanford a buscar ayuda” (I have to design the rocket in 3D, put together the business plan and go to Stanford UniversityStanford UniversityStanford University is a research university in California founded by Leland and Jane Stanford in 1885 and opened in 1891.Open the full entry to look for help). He won a full-ride scholarship (“beca full ride”) to Stanford University that covered his expenses. Recalling how he presented his rocket plan to professors, he said: “El primer profesor se me rio en la cara. El segundo, también” (The first professor laughed in my face. The second one too); the third advised him to finish an undergraduate degree and a master’s before returning to the business plan.⁠[1]

While at Stanford University he began building a rocket in his room; in six months, with $5,000 in borrowed money, he finished a five-meter rocket. At a test launch in the Mojave Desert, in temperatures above 50 degrees Celsius, it failed because the engine had not been tested beforehand. He then stopped attending classes, lived in an AirbnbAirbnbAirbnb is a travel platform for booking stays, experiences, and services, co-founded by Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia, and Nathan Blecharczyk and headquartered in San Francisco, United States; its Class A common stock trades on Nasdaq under the symbol ABNB. The business began with hosting guests in the founders’ home in 2007, then joined YC’s Winter 2009 batch, and gradually expanded into local experiences, services, and boutique hotels.Open the full entry, and used the money he saved on food and lodging to build an engine test bench, which caught fire on the first attempt. A liquid-fuel engine that he built later broke; on a final attempt, with $500 and a supplier’s help in inspecting the welds, the engine started. In 2017 he returned to Argentina.⁠[1]

In January 2019 angel investors put about $100,000 into his venture, but not for a business model based on building rockets. He changed course and turned to a spacecraft that moves satellites from low Earth orbit, about 500 kilometers up, to geostationary orbit at 35,786 kilometers. iProUP writes that the name Epic is a metaphor for intense, wild, strange and thrilling impulses. Letra P writes that he founded Epic Aerospace in 2019.⁠[1][2]

Epic Aerospace went through Y Combinator’s Summer 2019 batch (S19); Y Combinator’s company page describes it as “Last-mile delivery for satellites” and lists him as founder. Letra P writes that the company received its initial funding from the American accelerator. In his Y Combinator pitch he said: “Tengo 21 años y estoy construyendo cohetes desde los 15. Con Epic, queremos mover satélites a su órbita final” (I am 21 and have been building rockets since I was 15. With Epic, we want to move satellites to their final orbit); his mentors advised him to be clear about who his customer is and to make something he loves.⁠[3][4][2][1]

In August 2019 he closed a new funding round of just over $1 million.⁠[1]

On the evening of January 14, 2020, Epic Aerospace’s engine had its first test in Ezeiza; he recalled: “El motor hizo una llamarada y salió volando cinco metros” (The engine flared up and flew five meters). A second test followed at 8 p.m. on March 19, when the engine fired for half a second and then shut off. The COVID-19 pandemic caused delays; afterward the team ran more than 80 engine tests and went through three iterations of the test bench. iProUP also writes that over six months the team ran 200 engine tests and raised the engine’s efficiency from 80% to 96%.⁠[1]

On December 30, 2020, the Thiel Foundation named 24 people into the 2020 class of Thiel Fellows, among them him. In the format “Name: Hometown, Current Location,” the list gives him as “Buenos Aires, Argentina” and says that “Epic Aerospace is building a last-mile delivery service for rockets and satellites.”⁠[5]

He closed another funding round, whose amount he preferred not to disclose, that raised enough to buy from SpaceX in October 2021 a launch scheduled for October of the following year. He said: “Fue una apuesta all-in. Nos la jugamos” (It was an all-in bet. We went for it). iProUP writes that the team’s engineers then included Ricardo Lang, chief structures engineer, formerly of CONAE, and Guido Marinelli, an engineer for “Sistemas de Control de Guía y Altitud” (guidance and altitude control systems), formerly of VENG.⁠[1]

For this mission the team needed the factory it was building in Ezeiza to produce a smaller, more efficient engine, and had to assemble in Uruguay imported parts that could not enter Argentina; the assembled vehicle was taken to the Universidad Nacional de La Plata for testing. A hurricane delayed the launch, and a team of ten traveled to Cape Canaveral on November 26. On January 3, 2023, Epic Aerospace’s first orbital transfer vehicle, CHIMERA LEO 1, was launched on SpaceX’s Transporter 6 mission; he called it the “primer vehículo de transferencia orbital de América Latina” (first orbital transfer vehicle of Latin America). iProUP gives its specifications as 1.20 m × 1.20 m × 82 cm, 120 kg, a specific impulse of 295 seconds, a 200 kg payload and a delta-v of 950 m/s. He said that “tuvimos desperfectos en un sistema que habíamos comprado” (we had faults in a system that we had bought), that “Es parte del aprendizaje” (It is part of the learning), and that “lanzamos y se destrabó la parte comercial” (we launched and the commercial side was unlocked).⁠[1]

A report by Argentina’s Ministerio de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación, “Emprendedores del espacio en Argentina,” describes Epic Aerospace as a company based in Argentina and the United StatesUnited StatesThe United States is a federal country in North America made up of 50 states, the District of Columbia as the seat of government, and territories such as Puerto Rico and Guam; its capital is Washington, D.C. The Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The 2020 census (April 1, 2020) counted a resident population of 331,449,281, and the 435 seats of the House of Representatives are apportioned among the states on the basis of the census.Open the full entry that offers transport services in space, founded by “Ignacio Montero”; for this purpose it developed Chimera LEO-1, a so-called space tug launched in January 2023, and the company also designs and manufactures propulsion systems. Letra P lists CHIMERA LEO-1 as one of the company’s experimental launches, in 2023.⁠[6][2]

On August 19, 2023, the Argentine outlet iProUP published a long profile of him, calling him, at 25, the “Elon MuskElon MuskElon Musk is an entrepreneur who founded SpaceX and has long served as chief executive of Tesla; he also took part in creating PayPal, OpenAI, Neuralink, The Boring Company, and xAI. He acquired Twitter in 2022, and his businesses span spaceflight, electric vehicles, energy, artificial intelligence, and social media.Open the full entry argentino” (Argentine Elon Musk). He said at the time that the company had two customers and had earned revenue from selling one vehicle, without giving figures, and that the goal was to break even within a year with revenue of a few million dollars. The company planned a second mission, perhaps by the middle of the following year, with CHIMERA GEO, a model measuring 1.40 m × 1.20 m × 60 cm and weighing 115 kg, with a specific impulse of 310 seconds, a 200 kg payload, a delta-v of 1,800 m/s and a price of $1,250,000, which he said was “tres veces” (three times) cheaper than any other option. He envisioned becoming a space “freight-forwarder” by 2025, buying cargo capacity on every SpaceX launch, with revenue of up to $100 million; deploying a constellation of about 50 reusable vehicles by 2026; and raising a new round soon. He said: “Queremos ser el SpaceX del transporte orbital” (We want to be the SpaceX of orbital transport).⁠[1]

iProUP also writes that the market for geostationary insertion is estimated at more than $3 billion and that Euroconsult forecasts 120 orbital transfer vehicles in operation by 2031; the competitors it names include Launcher, Impulse Space, Atomos, D-Orbit, Exolaunch, Exotrail, Momentus and SpaceMachines.⁠[1]

A release of Argentina’s Secretaría de Innovación, Ciencia y Tecnología, published by DPL News on February 20, 2025, described him as a 27-year-old Argentine engineer and Epic Aerospace as a startup that builds space tugs (“remolcadores espaciales”) to place small satellites, which carry no engines or fuel, into their exact orbits. It said that about two months earlier he and his team had met Darío Genua, the secretariat’s secretary, who committed to speeding up the procedures for importing key parts; Genua then toured the company’s technical test plant in Ezeiza, watched thruster tests on the tugs, and said: “Epic ha sorteado todos los obstáculos para lograr llevar un remolcador al espacio junto con SpaceX y la NASANASAThe National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the U.S. federal agency responsible for the civilian space program, aeronautics research and space science. Established by law in 1958 and headquartered in Washington, D.C., it has run programs including Mercury, the Apollo Moon landings, the Space Shuttle, the International Space Station and Artemis.Open the full entry” (Epic has overcome every obstacle to take a tug into space together with SpaceX and NASA). The secretariat, Epic Aerospace, Argentina’s National Commission on Space Activities (CONAE) and the technology services company VENG signed a framework agreement to promote public–private collaboration in space research, development and science. In 2026 Letra P published a photograph of Darío Genua with him during a visit to the Ezeiza plant.⁠[7][2]

Epic Aerospace’s orbital tug CHIMERA GEO 1 was launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 from Kennedy Space Center in FloridaFloridaFlorida is a U.S. state occupying mainly the Florida peninsula, with its capital at Tallahassee; its most populous city is Jacksonville. It entered the Union on March 3, 1845, as the 27th state, and had a population of 21,538,187 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry together with Intuitive Machines’ IM-2 lunar mission. El Litoral gives the launch date as February 27, 2025, and Exolaunch’s mission page as February 26, 2025. El Litoral writes that the tug is meant for last-mile transport of satellites that have no propulsion of their own; it is 1.2 m long, 88 cm wide and 60 cm high, weighs 145 kg, has a low-cost chemical-fuel engine with 90 kg of thrust, and can reposition satellites of up to 200 kg. CenTec Rafaela, in Santa Fe province, collaborated on manufacturing parts of its propulsion system by metal 3D printing.⁠[8][9]

Exolaunch writes that its EXOpod Nova deployer was mounted on Epic Aerospace’s orbital transfer vehicle flying to GEO, to deploy another satellite at a precise mission phase after launch, and that its CarboNIX separation system was to provide deployment for Epic Aerospace’s payload. Before the launch, the secretariat’s release said that the vehicle was to reach geostationary orbit, about 35,000 kilometers up, to cover an orbital position. Letra P lists CHIMERA GEO-1 as one of the company’s experimental launches, in 2025, and writes that it was tied to a lunar mission that did not reach its intended objectives.⁠[9][7][2]

On March 28, 2026, the Argentine outlet Letra P wrote that Epic Aerospace runs industrial operations between Argentina and Uruguay, and that officials from the science area had visited its facilities, signed cooperation agreements and committed to facilitating the import of key components. The article contrasts this support with the government’s cuts to the science system and the paralysis of projects, and writes that the company had made two experimental launches “sin consolidar servicios comerciales sostenidos” (without consolidating sustained commercial services); it says the company plans to use CONAE facilities to develop suborbital launchers while the official Tronador launcher program lacks sufficient funding.⁠[2]

On August 27, 2026, Epic Aerospace opened new facilities at Zonamérica in Uruguay, with President Yamandú Orsi and Minister of Industry, Energy and Mining Fernanda Cardona among those attending; a photograph published by Uruguay’s Presidency shows him at the opening with Yamandú Orsi, Fernanda Cardona and Orlando Dovat. The facilities include a 300-kilonewton vibration test system that can test satellite equipment of up to 2,500 kg, funded by Uruguay’s National Agency for Research and Innovation (ANII) and the Oreste Fiandra trust. At the event the company presented CHIMERA GEO 2, a 780 kg space tug for missions to geostationary orbit; the Presidency’s release says that it would make Uruguay the first Latin American country with this kind of transport capability and cut mission costs from $100 million to less than $10 million.⁠[10][11]

Uruguay XXI, in an article of September 1, 2026, describes him as the Argentine engineer who founded Epic Aerospace and describes Epic Aerospace as a U.S. aerospace company that manufactures, assembles and tests orbital transfer vehicles at Zonamérica, with the new facilities expanding the operations it already had in Uruguay.⁠[11]

iProUP writes that his teenage home was in Buenos Aires and that his mother was a flight attendant, suggesting that his fascination with space may have come from her.⁠[1]

Y Combinator: Official website: https://www.ycombinator.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[3]

Thiel FellowshipThiel FellowshipThe Thiel Fellowship is a two-year grant program started by investor Peter Thiel and run by the Thiel Foundation that funds young people who skip or stop out of college to build new things instead. The program has been criticized by figures in education for encouraging young people to leave college.Open the full entry: Official website: https://thielfellowship.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[12]

LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry: Public profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ignacio-b%C3%A9li%C3%A8res-montero-14b457b6/ (opens in a new window).⁠[4]