PARIS/ROME, Oct 22 (Reuters) - Europe's aerospace giants

kept investors waiting an extra day for details of a new space

champion on Wednesday as lawyers and advisers pored over the

smallprint, but merger plans remained intact, people familiar

with the talks said.

Reuters reported this week that Airbus, Thales

and Leonardo had reached a framework deal to

pool their satellite making activities to chip away at the

dominance of Elon Musk's Starlink.

Initial plans for a Wednesday announcement slipped but there

was no major new obstacle and a deal appeared to have been

pushed back by no more than 24 or 48 hours, barring an

unforeseen and more substantive problem, the people said.

"The announcement is ready; that doesn't mean you don't have

some last-minute details. It is industrially, technically and

financially complicated," one of the people said.

Thales, Airbus and Leonardo all declined comment.

The talks mark the latest attempt to tie together Europe's

fragmented and struggling satellites industry.

Europe's top players - Airbus and a pair of ventures

controlled by Italy's Leonardo and France's Thales - have been

dwarfed by rivals led by Musk's SpaceX.

They plan to combine satellite assets into a new holding

company with about one third each after a series of balancing

payments, but the new structure will take up to two years to put

in place pending regulatory approvals, sources have said.

A previous attempt to combine hit EU anti-trust obstacles.

The companies are expected to set out the broad structure

and objectives of the merger plan, code-named Projet Bromo,

without dwelling on details of corporate governance which will

be decided later after a period of standalone operations.

The balance of power and question of who appoints

chairperson, CEO and CFO have previously caused friction in past

European aerospace mergers, including at Airbus itself.

But sources said there was a strong commitment between the

parties to co-operate on satellites, in part driven by losses

and falling market share.