Filtronic has secured a $68.1m (£51.3m) follow-on order from SpaceX, its largest order from the satellite company to date.

The contract covers Filtronic's Cerus E-band gallium nitride (GaN) solid-state power amplifier units and is expected to be largely fulfilled during the financial year ending May 2028.

The £51.3m order is equivalent to about 92 per cent of Filtronic's £55.5m revenue in the year to May 2026.

It surpasses the $62.5m contract SpaceX placed in August 2025 for Filtronic's next-generation GaN E-band technology, which was previously the largest contract in the company's history.

The amplifiers are used in high-frequency communications. Filtronic says GaN provides higher output power, greater efficiency and better thermal performance than traditional gallium arsenide technology, making it suitable for applications including low Earth orbit satellite communications.

Filtronic chief executive Nat Edington said the latest order provided "extended order visibility and coverage over the next couple of years".

Filtronic has expanded its manufacturing capacity alongside the growth of the SpaceX relationship. The company opened a new 44,000 sq ft headquarters and manufacturing facility at NETPark in Sedgefield in February, with capacity to support more than £200m of annual revenue.

The scale of the SpaceX relationship is also evident in Filtronic's customer mix. SpaceX accounted for 68 per cent of group revenue in the year to May 2026, down from 83 per cent a year earlier as Filtronic increased revenue from other customers.

The company has also been building business with other satellite customers. In September, it secured an $8m contract with an unnamed US customer to design, develop and build prototype units intended for satellite deployment.

That followed approximately $0.5m of development work announced in June and a separate $8m amplifier contract placed by the same customer in March.

Revenue from the prototype programme is expected across Filtronic's 2027 and 2028 financial years.