EADS will hold 70 percent of the joint venture and Finmeccanica 30 percent, he said, confirming a report in the daily Financial Times Deutschland.

The Italian company currently holds a 15 percent stake in construction of the Ariane.

The new company will be created in response to a request by the European Space Agency, which has called for increased cooperation in Europe within the framework of its Future Launcher Preparatory Program aimed at developing a new Ariane rocket.

The life cycle of a generation of rockets is estimated by experts at about 20 years, which would make the Ariane 5 obsolete by 2020, the EADS spokesman said.

The European satellite market is facing a major overhaul with a series of corporate mergers in the face of sharp decrease in the number of launches worldwide.

French telecommunications equipment group Alcatel and Finmeccanica agreed this month to merge their space operations by creating two jointly owned companies, one focused on satellite manufacturing and one on services.

SPACE.WIRE