The contract is to be signed later Monday in the presence of German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder at the ILA air show near Berlin, he said.

EADS holds a stake of about 20 percent in Arianespace, which operates and markets the Ariane line of rockets used to launch satellites.

"Thirty launchers, which comes to about three billion euros, is in an order placed by Arianespace with EADS," Francois Augue, chief executive at EADS Space, told the LCI radio network.

EADS Space will become the sole provider of the new generation Ariane-5 launcher, while Airanespace will retain its commercial responsibilities.

The arrangement is predicted to reduce the production cost of the launchers by 30-35 percent compared with Ariane-4, the last of which was sent aloft in February 2003.

Meeting in Paris in May of that year, ministers from the 15-member European Space Agency backed a 228-million-euro program to finance the Ariane-5.

EADS Space sustained a loss of 400 million euros in 2003, after 268 million in 2002, because of a restructuring charge of 288 million euros.

The shortfall at the subsidiary is expected to be absorbed this year, after which the unit is predicted to return to profit.

SPACE.WIRE