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jdccdevel writes:

Airbus, which leads production of the Ariane rocket, has a new re-usable rocket concept called Adeline.

The BBC explains:

The firm's engineers believe the basic Adeline idea could be incorporated into any liquid-fuelled launcher, however big or small.

It takes the form of a winged module that goes on the bottom of the rocket stack.

Inside are the main engines and the avionics - the high-value parts on all rockets.

The module would be integral to the job of lifting the mission off the pad in the normal way, but then detach itself from the upper-stages of the rocket once the propellants in the tanks above it were exhausted.

The Adeline module's next step would be re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere. For this, it would have a protective heat shield on its bulbous nose.

At a certain point in the descent, Adeline would pull up using its small winglets, and steer itself towards a runway.

Small deployable propellers would aid control as it essentially operated like a drone to find its way home.

Spacenews.com elaborates:

Herve Gilibert, technical director for Airbus’ Space Systems division, said the Adeline propulsion unit — engine and avionics — is where lies most of the value of the first stage. The Airbus team concluded that SpaceX’s design of returning the full stage to Earth could be simplified by separating the propulsion bay from the rest of the stage, protecting the motor on reentry and, using the winglets and turbofans, return horizontally to a conventional air strip.

“We are using an aerodynamic shield so that the motor is not subjected to such high stress on reentry,” Gilibert said. “We need very little fuel for the turbofans and the performance penalty we pay for the Ariane 6 launcher is far less than the 30 percent or more performance penalty that SpaceX pays for the reusable Falcon 9 first stage.

It sounds like they're planning on modifying the Ariane 6 (set to fly for the first time in 2020) to use this technology at some point, but not right away. They expect it will reduce launch costs by a projected 20 to 30 percent.