Tech Focus:

• Teleportation

• Advanced Equipment Upgrades

• Augmented implants

• Recombinator Upgrades

• Power Generators and Transmission

• Scanning Devices

• Space Ship engines, shields and technological upgrades

• Energy Shields

Affinity:

Philosophies: Barricade, Sanctus Syngian, Scholars of Divinity

Bio

ESSA focuses on the bleeding edge of advanced tech such as shield generators, teleportation, and the Recombinator. Of all the Alexandrian Highborne tech that was recovered after the Galactic War, ESSA owns 90% of the patents.

In the search for greater scientific advancement they can often lose touch with the "people" factor, tending to look at a person as less of a living thing but rather a collection of chemical processes and personality algorithms. 

History

ESSA has roots that go back to the very first corporation to launch a commercially funded shuttle to dock with the International Space Station (Coring Industries). Coring had issues with Millenium Global that forced it to merge with the Chinese space program to continue operations. The Chinese space program then merged with the Russian Space program in 2058 to form the first iteration of ESSA.

2058 - Originally formed as the Eurasian Space-Science Association when the Chinese and Russian space programs merged. They were a purely scientific body at this time and took over main control of the International Space Station. In a colossal PR blunder they renamed it the ESSA Space Station which people preferred to call the ESS-ASS.

Later in 2058 ESSA went into consumer electronics to help fund their research.

2062 - ESSA renames itself the Earth Space-Science Association. This was in response to a major political upheaval in Europe, Asia and Africa leading to a radical change in borders and governmental entities. Where many small countries existed, now stood much larger Republics of unified nation-states.

2063 - ESSA Researchers discover a new hypertensile material which they name ECTAF (Excited Carbon Toroidal Attenuating Fibers) capable of withstanding extreme cutting or tearing forces.

2073 - ESSA builds the Orbital Transmission Elevator using ECTAF technology. Transferring supplies and personnel into orbit now becomes extremely inexpensive. Despite remaining tension between ESSA and MG, ESSA permits all commercial and non-commercial uses of the Elevator, in exchange for modest research donations, of course. 

2088 - Excelsior, a faster than light space probe launched by ESSA reaches Alpha Centauri and begins studying it from orbit.

2093 - ESSA completes construction of two new research stations on the moons of Mars. One on Phobos and one on Deimos.

2102 - Citing “Poor Civil Management” the Mars colonies separate from their home nations and form their own central government. Earth Commonwealths attempt to stop the separation through Military force, but are prevented by mutual resistance from ESSA, SpaceTech and MG who all agreed a territorial war on Mars would be counter to their respective interests.

2102-2130 - Mars colonization continues. Earth governments refuse to advance very much in the face of a multi-planet civilization. 60% of Earth’s population and 100% of Mars’ is now employed by one of the Big 3.

2178 - The first Multi-Generational Colony Ship "Long Haul" is launched by ESSA towards NEP 1 (the first discovered frontier planet with wild elements), expected to arrive by 2652. 

2221 - ESSA, SpaceTech, and MG form the ICP to unite all space-bound humanity against what they thought was an imminent invasion threat.

2226 - Earth refuses to join the ICP, so in collaboration with the ICP and the other corporations ESSA shuts down its Space Elevator (the Orbital Transmission Elevator) cutting ties with Earth.

2227 - The first Daedalus Battlecruiser comes off the assembly line built with ESSA designed energy-based weaponry.

2253 - ESSA Colony Ship "Long Haul" reports unexpected failures in the habitation and food processing sections of the ship. Due to limited functionality of these facilities, the Ship's captain begins a rationing program.

2279 - Major thrust failure on the ESSA Colony Ship "Long Haul". Expected arrival on NEP 1 is now calculated at 10,000 years. Ship captain begins search for closer inhabitable planets.

2312 - Communications suddenly go silent with the colony ship Long Haul. While the phenomenon was not understood at the time, we now know that their ship passed through a cloud of unstable quantum particles that disrupted the quantum entanglement device they were using to communicate with ESSA.  With the speed of the colony ship and its distance from home galaxy, traditional radio communication was impractical.

2655 - Ambassadors of the "Highborne" of planet Alexandria arrive at the edge of the Sol galaxy. Their approach was completely undetected. Once they established contact, they identified themselves as the former colonists of the "Long Haul" (ESSA's Colony Ship that never made it to NEP 1). The Highborne species are the descendants of ESSA's first colony ship that never arrived.

2711 - Teleportation research stations, owned by ESSA, on Phobos and Deimos go silent. Rumors abound of a portal to hell, demons walking the surface of the moons and a gallant soldier fighting them all off to save humanity. Purely folk-tale nonsense of course.