French propulsion startup ThrustMe unexpectedly made it into orbit early this month with its innovative propulsion system placed aboard a Chinese cubesat.

Dianfeng, or Xiaoxiang-1 (08), a six-unit cubesat developed by privately owned Spacety, was a secondary payload on the launch of the Gaofen-7 civilian Earth observation satellite Nov. 2, along with a first satellite for Sudan.

As with many Chinese launches, secondary payloads were not announced until after launch success was declared, but further surprises were aboard.