Archives for January 2021

The European Space Agency (ESA) and Airbus have agreed on service orders for two independent payload missions to be launched to the Bartolomeo payload hosting facility on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2022 and 2024, respectively.

The first payload mission is ESA’s Exobiology Platform (EXPO). This facility carries a set of radiation experiments aimed at better understanding the evolution of organic molecules and organisms in the space. Placed in a Zenith-facing slot, the facility will connect two scientific modules to Bartolomeo. These modules will host everything needed for the experiments, including the scientific sample containers, fluidics systems and sensors related to the individual experiments called Exocube, IceCold and OREOcube. At the end of the three-year mission, the samples will be returned to Earth for detailed investigation and analysis.

The second payload is the Euro Material Ageing experiment platform (SESAME), developed by the French Space Agency (CNES). This mission will study the ageing behavior of new materials in space and will also make use of Bartolomeo’s payload return option. After a year of exposure in space, the experiments will be returned to Earth, allowing scientists to thoroughly investigate the samples and fully understand the effects of the space environment on the materials.

These service orders, amounting to 6.5 million euros, are the first under a new framework agreement which ESA and Airbus have put in place, pre-defining the overall commercial conditions for ESA payload missions on Bartolomeo.

Airbus’ Bartolomeo platform was launched and robotically attached to the ISS Columbus Module in 2020. Following the final connection of the cabling during an Extravehicular Activity (EVA), or ‘spacewalk’, in early 2021, the platform will be ready for in-space commissioning.

Bartolomeo is an Airbus investment into the ISS infrastructure, enabling hosting of up to 12 external payloads in the space environment, providing unique opportunities for in-orbit demonstration and verification missions. It is operated in a partnership between Airbus, ESA, NASA and the ISS National Laboratory.

Bartolomeo is suitable for many types of missions, including Earth Observation (EO), environmental and climate research, robotics, material sciences and astrophysics. It provides sought-after payload-hosting capabilities for customers and researchers to test space technologies, verify a new space business approach, conduct scientific experiments in microgravity or enter into in-space manufacturing endeavours.

Launch opportunities are available on every servicing mission to the ISS, which occur about every three months. The payload accommodation allows slots for a wide range of payload mass, from 5 to 450 kg. As an evolution of the platform, Airbus will provide optical data downlink capacity of one to two terabytes per day.

Payloads can be prepared and ready to operate within one and a half years after contract signature. Payload sizes, interfaces, preparation before launch and integration processes are largely standardized. This reduces lead times and significantly reduces costs compared to traditional mission costs.

Airbus offers this easy access to space as an all-in-one mission service. This includes technical support in preparing the payload mission; launch and installation; operations and data transfer; and an optional return to Earth.

“With this framework contract, we are making it significantly easier for ESA to use the Bartolomeo Service for quick and affordable use of the ISS,” said David Parker, ESA Director of Human and Robotic Exploration. “Commercial arrangements have been streamlined, which enables our researchers to enjoy the full benefits of Bartolomeo’s short lead times and high flexibility. We are very pleased to have the first two ESA payloads secured on the platform, and are looking forward to using this new European asset on the ISS.”

Andreas Hammer, Head of Space Exploration at Airbus, said, “We are looking forward to working with our partners at ESA on bringing these two and future payloads to space – and back again as needed. The strong interest from across ESA and other institutions as well as a number of commercial players confirms the need for our efficient and affordable payload hosting solutions in LEO.”

Led by the SmartSat Cooperative Research Centre (CRC), the AUD$6.5 million SASAT1 Space Services Mission was announced in Adelaide, South Australia.

Based at Lot Fourteen, which is also home to the Australian Space Agency, the SmartSat Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) will undertake the application prototyping.

Local satellite manufacturing company Inovor Technologies will design and build the satellite while South Australian space company Myriota is contracted for the Internet of Things (IoT) space services.

The SASAT1 Space Services Mission will commence in early 2021 to deliver the satellite in 15 months for launch into orbit. The satellite will be available for a further three years to 2025 for data collection and operations under current funding.

SmartSat CRC Chief Executive Professor Andy Koronios said the mission will provide opportunities for startup companies to use the ongoing data captured by the satellite to develop analytics applications for government and commercial use. “The SASAT1 Space Services Mission positions South Australia to play an even greater role in national initiatives like water quality monitoring and bushfire mitigation,” he said.

The SASAT1 Space Services Mission is funded through the South Australian Government’s Economic and Business Growth Fund.

The South Australian space ecosystem has grown in recent years, with collaborations with NASA and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and the presence of numerous successful startups such as Fleet Space Technologies, Lux Aerobot, and Southern Launch.

News story is courtesy of The Lead.

Satellogic has announced a Multiple Launch Services Agreement (MLA) with SpaceX — through this agreement, SpaceX becomes Satellogic’s preferred vendor for rideshare missions.

The first launch, scheduled for June 2021, will deliver Satellogic satellites to LEO via a Falcon 9 rocket.

This agreement with SpaceX will enable Satellogic to maintain and extend their position as the global leader in high-resolution, high-frequency geospatial analytics. Satellogic expects to complete the initial buildout of their Earth Observation Constellation by the end of 2022. At that point the company will have the capacity to deliver weekly, high-resolution coverage of the entire landmass of the planet. Through a series of rideshare launches over the next two years and beyond, the company will be moving from weekly to daily world remaps by 2025 with more than 300 microsatellites in orbit.

Both Satellogic and SpaceX have a vertically integrated approach. Satellogic builds their own spacecraft, manages an entire constellation, and performs data analyses, creating efficiencies that drive down the cost of geospatial analytics at an order of magnitude far beyond that of their competitors. Similarly, SpaceX’s ownership over the entire development process for their rockets has enabled new advances in launch technology. Falcon 9’s reusability allows SpaceX to refly the most expensive parts of the rocket, driving down the cost of space access.

This partnership puts Satellogic in a unique position to capitalize on SpaceX’s competitive rideshare program and frequent launch schedule. By securing SpaceX as their preferred partner for rideshare missions, Satellogic will be able to accelerate the time between satellite development and deployment. This accelerated timeline will allow Satellogic to continue to rapidly expand their in-orbit capacity, while also increasing revisit capabilities to monitor the planet on a high-frequency basis, serving customers at the right price.

With Satellogic’s collection capacity and unit economics, the company is poised to democratize Earth Observation (EO) imagery by massively expanding their capacity to serve large verticals including agriculture, energy, forestry, insurance, telecommunications and financial services, among others. Satellogic provides a disruptive and compelling economic use case to current users of EO imagery, as well the ability to simplify the image collection process, eventually replacing considerably less efficient technologies and solutions such as drones, helicopters, planes, and boots-on-the-ground manpower.

After completing three launches in 2020, Satellogic’s in-orbit capacity now enables access to up to four daily revisits of any point of interest and the collection of more than 4 million sq. km per day in high-resolution data. This industry-leading capacity expands access to sub-meter imagery for both Satellogic Solutions and Dedicated Satellite Constellations (DSC) customers. Further, Satellogic’s robust capacity and today’s MLA with SpaceX represents a new and exciting phase in Satellogic’s growing relationship with the US government and commercial partners and customers.

“What SpaceX has accomplished through their agile launch schedule is a perfect complement to our own business model at Satellogic — which prioritizes the ability to iterate quickly at every stage of development, as well as quickly deploy updated capabilities to our customers,” said Alan Kharsansky, VP of Mission Engineering and Operations at Satellogic. “As the global leader in high-resolution, high-frequency data collection from space, this partnership enables us to continue to grow our fleet at an aggressive pace that matches the increased demand for geospatial insights across industries.”

“Satellogic’s business model makes them the ideal partner for SpaceX’s rideshare missions. SpaceX’s frequent launch schedule means that Satellogic’s end customers will get the latest satellite technology as soon as it’s ready to launch,” said Tom Ochinero, Vice President of Commercial Sales at SpaceX. “We’re excited to support Satellogic’s ambitions to democratize access to geospatial analytics.”

Gilmour Space Technologies completed a successful hotfire of the world’s largest, single-port, hybrid rocket engine.

Gilmour Space continues to demonstrate key sovereign space and industry capabilities as it prepares to launch its first commercial payloads from Australian companies Space Machines Company and Fireball International.

“We achieved a record 91 kilonewtons (or 9 tonnes-force) of thrust in this initial verification test of our main engine,” said Adam Gilmour, CEO and Co-Founder of Gilmour Space, a Queensland-based company that is developing a three-stage rocket capable of launching small satellites into LEO. “This is the engine that will be powering the first and second stages of our Eris orbital vehicle as it launches to space. I’m happy to report that all systems performed very well during this 10-second test. Our team will be going through the results and conducting longer duration and higher thrust tests in the weeks ahead. Many of our Eris launch vehicle components have completed development testing, and the first flight articles are on the manufacturing floor ready to be assembled — this is going to be a busy year for us; it’s the year we build our rocket.”

“We are delighted by this successful hotfire test, which demonstrates Gilmour’s progress towards a successful orbital launch in 2022,” said Rajat Kulshrestha, Co-Founder and CEO of Space Machines Company. “Together with Space Machines Company, important sovereign launch and in-space transport capabilities for Australia are becoming a reality.”

A company produced video is available for viewing at this direct link…

Aurora Insight is scheduled to launch its second, satellite-based. radio frequency spectrum sensor on SpaceX’s Transporter-1, on Friday, January 22nd from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

The launch is a part of SpaceX’s dedicated rideshare mission on the Falcon 9 rocket and will be broadcast live at www.spacex.com/launches. Aurora will host a special live stream discussion event on the morning of the launch, and details can be found at www.aurorainsight.com/charlie. Launching the satellite-based radio frequency spectrum sensor will unlock new opportunities and answers about wireless spectrum — one of the most valuable resources in the digital economy.

Charlie is the first of a two-part satellite mission this quarter. Aurora Insight partnered with NanoAvionics, a leading nanosatellite bus manufacturer and mission integrator, to build and integrate two nanosatellites, as well as provide launch services. Both 6U smallsats are based on NanoAvionics’ standard M6P bus in a higher performance configuration, providing greater technical performance capabilities for Aurora’s radio frequency spectrum mission. The second satellite is also scheduled to launch in the first quarter of 2021.

Regarding the launch, Aurora Insight’s CEO Jennifer Alvarez explained, “This technology will provide Aurora Insight’s clients with an entirely new understanding of the RF spectrum environment, and we can shed light on the ambiguity that has surrounded it for years. The answers we uncover will help advance communications around the world and enable organizations to plan, invest, and move forward with a data-driven strategy.”

The satellite-based radio frequency spectrum sensor has unprecedented capabilities, including the ability to:

• Monitor the deployment and growth of terrestrial mobile networks
• Monitor the on-orbit radio frequency environmental performance to understand when and how ground-based transmissions affect satellite performance
• Identify sources of harmful interference to on-orbit assets

Traditional methods of measuring spectrum are usually ad hoc, limited in scale, outdated and offer poor visibility into the availability of wireless. Aurora has developed an autonomous sensor network, powered by machine learning and advanced radio signal processing, to continuously sample and render the full radio spectrum environment.

Aurora Insight offers accurate, impartial insights on the radio frequency spectrum to inform the next generation of wireless services. Through an autonomous sensor network and machine learning of radio signals, Aurora continuously samples and reports on the radio frequency spectrum, from licensed infrastructure to dynamic utilization, enabling the best use of this scarce commodity. Companies around the globe rely on Aurora Insight’s unmatched data to help analyze, predict, transform, and answer questions about the next generation of applications. Headquartered in Denver, Colorado, and funded by the country’s top innovation investors, Aurora Insight is pushing the boundaries to help advance global communication. The team is composed of data scientists, engineers, and industry veterans, who leverage a deep expertise and understanding of the challenges that face the communications industry.

The space industry seeks new solutions to ensure economic and environmental space sustainability with the rise of satellite mega-constellations. A solution lies in the use of on-orbit propulsion, but traditional systems are not fit for the New Space paradigm.

ThrustMe has announced that they have successfully tested the first iodine-fueled electric propulsion system in space aboard the Spacety Beihangkongshi-1 satellite. This world first, on-orbit demo has the potential to transform the space industry.

On December 28, 2020, the first iodine electric propulsion system to be launched into space was successfully fired, with a second successful test on January 2, 2021. Both test burns were performed by ThrustMe’s NPT30-I2-1U propulsion system onboard the Beihangkongshi -1 satellite from Spacety.

The satellite was launched on November 6, 2020, and after several weeks of satellite commissioning, the propulsion system was operated during two, 90-minute burns that resulted in a total altitude change of 700 m. These tests represent the first in-space operation of the NPT30-I2-1U and the first demonstration of iodine as a viable propellant for electric propulsion systems: an important step in accelerating its commercial adoption.

A breakthrough for the satellite industry.

The NPT30-I2-1U allows propulsion systems to be delivered completely prefilled to customers and that allows the satellite integration process to be significantly simplified and streamlined. Therefore, iodine offers the potential to provide both economic, and environmental sustainability for the space industry. Indeed, most conventional electric propulsion systems make use of xenon or krypton which are expensive, rare and must be stored under very high pressure. Furthermore, satellite assembly, integration and testing can be more complicated as specialized equipment and trained personnel are required to safely load fuel tanks with such propellants.

Iodine, by contrast, can be stored as a solid at room temperature, is much less expensive, more abundant, and completely unpressurized.

In 2020, the European Space Agency (ESA), supported the development of ThrustMe’s NPT30-I2-1U propulsion system through the ARTES C&G (Competitiveness and Growth) program (funded by France) for innovative technologies for the SATCOM industry. In addition to the on-orbit demonstration, the NPT30-I2-1U is being prepared for the GEO satellite market and a separate unit is currently undergoing extensive radiation testing, which ThrustMe stated is proceeding as planned.

The development of ThrustMe’s NPT30-I2-1U was also supported by the French National Space Agency (CNES) via a project as part of their R&T program.

“In 2008, we identified iodine as an ideal propellant for electric propulsion. Since then, we have developed a number of key technologies to be able to offer, as of today, a complete, standalone, propulsion system to meet current and emerging market needs. This is an important product for our customers as it allows them to deploy their satellite constellations, and to take corrective actions to mitigate collision or debris risks”, said Ane Aanesland, CEO of ThrustMe.

“It has been a long road to bring this product from dream to reality. To make it happen we had to innovate, develop a complex system from the ground up, and perform fundamental research studies since many properties of iodine are missing in scientific databases. I am happy that we have ended up with a very high performance, safe and reliable propulsion system that is now available for any smallsat, said Dmytro Rafalskyi, CTO of ThrustMe.

“The successful launch and the first firings are significant milestones in the development of ThrustMe’s iodine electric propulsion system. We are pleased to support ThrustMe in the development and demonstration of this propulsion module through the ARTES C&G program,” noted Barnaby Osborne, Small Satellite Technology Coordinator, ESA Telecommunications and Integrated Applications.

“We are very happy to have supported the in-orbit demonstration of ThrustMe’s iodine electric propulsion system and are very pleased to have helped a French company achieve such a historic milestone,” added Thomas Liénart, Head of the Propulsion, Pyrotechnics and Aerothermodynamics office at CNES.

ThrustMe is a deep-tech space propulsion company, based in the Paris-region, France. It leverages more than 10 years of applied and fundamental research at Ecole Polytechnique and the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). ThrustMe offers a portfolio of turnkey propulsion systems that have been tested in space and are available for a wide range of satellites and space missions. Its unique products make use of breakthrough innovations, such as solid iodine propellant, to streamline delivery and integration with client satellites, and to enable future economic and environmental sustainability of the space industry.

The NPT30-I2-1U is a complete, standalone, propulsion system that includes all subsystems necessary for its operation such as the power processing unit, an intelligent operation controller, and iodine propellant storage and management. It has a 1-Unit CubeSat form factor, and is prefilled with solid, unpressurized, iodine propellant. The NPT30-I2-1U is the first iodine-fueled electric propulsion system to be launched into space, and can provide a total impulse of 5500 Ns at a maximum thrust of 1.1 mN and with a specific impulse up to 2450s. Extreme miniaturization of the system is achieved through several innovations that include pipe-less propellant delivery, custom RF generation technology, a dedicated plasma ignition system, and integrated thermal management. A high level of robustness and safety is achieved through the implementation of built-in self-test and self-tuning algorithms, and several layers of security checks.

OneWeb, jointly owned by the UK Government and Bharti Global, has secured additional funding from SoftBank Group Corp. (“SoftBank”) and Hughes Network Systems LLC (“Hughes”), bringing OneWeb’s total funding to $1.4 billion. The capital raised to date positions the Company to be fully funded for its first-generation satellite fleet, totaling 648 satellites, by the end of 2022.

OneWeb’s mission is to deliver broadband connectivity worldwide to bridge the global Digital Divide by offering everyone, everywhere, access that includes the Internet of Things (IoT) future and a pathway to 5G. OneWeb’s LEO satellite system includes a network of global gateway stations and a range of user terminals for different customer markets capable of delivering affordable, fast, high-bandwidth and low-latency communications services.

In December of 2020, OneWeb launched 36 new satellites, built at its Airbus Joint Venture assembly plant in Florida, USA, bringing the Company’s total fleet to 110 satellites, all fully-functioning and benefiting from International Telecommunication Union spectrum priority.

Sunil Bharti Mittal, Executive Chairman of OneWeb, commented, “We are delighted to welcome the investment from SoftBank and Hughes. Both are deeply familiar with our business, share our vision for the future, and their commitment allows us to capitalise on the significant growth opportunity ahead for OneWeb. We gain from their experience and capabilities, as we deliver a unique LEO network for the world.”

Secretary of State, BEIS, The Rt. Hon. Kwasi Kwarteng, MP said, “Our investment in OneWeb is part of our continued commitment to the UK’s space sector, putting Britain at the forefront of the latest technological advances. Today’s investment brings the company one step closer to delivering its mission to provide global broadband connectivity for people, businesses and governments, while potentially unlocking new research, development and manufacturing opportunities in the UK.”

Masayoshi Son, Representative Director, Corporate Officer, Chairman & CEO of SoftBank, said, “We are excited to support OneWeb as it increases capacity and accelerates towards commercialization. We are thrilled to continue our partnership with Bharti, the UK Government and Hughes to help OneWeb deliver on its mission to transform internet access around the world.”

Pradman Kaul, President of Hughes, remarked, “OneWeb continues to inspire the industry and attract the best players in the business to come together to bring its LEO constellation to fruition. The investments made today by Hughes and SoftBank will help realize the full potential of OneWeb in connecting enterprise, government and mobility customers, especially with multi-transport services that complement our own geostationary offerings in meeting and accelerating demand for broadband around the world.”

Neil Masterson, CEO of OneWeb, added, “OneWeb’s mission is to connect everyone, everywhere. We have made rapid progress to re-start the business since emerging from Chapter 11 in November. We welcome the investments by SoftBank and Hughes as further proof of progress towards delivering our goal.”

In connection with the investment, SoftBank will gain a seat on the OneWeb Board of Directors. Hughes is an investor through its parent company EchoStar, and also an ecosystem partner, developing essential ground network technology for the OneWeb system.

Additionally, the firm has reduced its request for US market access from 47,884 to 6,372 satellites. Together with the satellites for which it is already licensed by the FCC, the total constellation size will be roughly 7,000, down from the 48,000 or so proposed last year.

According to the company, this solidification of their constellation demonstrates the commitment and vision of OneWeb’s new owners, the UK Government and Bharti Global, who are dedicated to deploying a cost effective, responsible, and groundbreaking satellite network to deliver global broadband.

The firm stated that OneWeb remains focused on launching its first-generation system of 648 satellites and is on track to start regional commercial services within a year. This streamlining of activities highlights OneWeb’s plan for global connectivity services and for future generations and possibilities for the network.