ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the evolution that occurred with regard to the General Clauses and Conditions (GCC) for European Space Agency (ESA) contracts in the context of its recent reform. The institutional founding of European Space Research Organisation (ESRO) was considerably influenced by the European Organisation for Nuclear Research and its convention. The Agency's contracts are based on the ESA-GCC, which is a regulatory document aiming to be self-standing and, hence, requiring limited tailoring. A salient feature of the Agency's intellectual property rights (IPR) regime is that the contractor remains the owner of the IPR resulting from an ESA contract. As the European space industry currently undertakes development risks under the ESA contracts, it was deemed necessary to cap open-ended commitments and risks in order to foster innovation and technology development and to render the Agency a reliable partner.
