In general: A very positive fell and attitude during the whole congress. ESA, NASA, Roscosmos, China, Jaxa and the rest were all very optimistic and agreed on most of the next big steps for space exploration. Don’t think it has been this open before. (And of course, Elon Musk is preaching to the choir when talking about a concept for launchers that can do “everything”; launch satellites, supply ISS, go to moon, go to Mars (and return) as well as offer sub-orbital flights anywhere on Earth, and be 100% reusable.)
It’s also an impressive change in the professionalism in the smallsat/CubeSat business. The “small startups” have become quite grown up the past two years.
Specifics:
ISIS: Had a long meeting with Marc Bernabeu of ISIS on our HSI-mission. He was very interested and will get back with an overview of products and costs that can suit our purpose. The mission will need some engineering time from their side, on which level will be determined later.
ISIS provides basic drivers for subsystems + optional libraries with important functions, but in principle no higher-level software. They partner with KubOS that can do software. My impression is that it will be possible to access all parts of the satellite, ADCS, radios and more and write “parallel” software for them to do our own experiments. I’m expecting something back in a couple of weeks. Action: Await information
Utias SFL: Had a short chat with Freddy Pranajaya (dep. director for innovation). He underlined that we should not lock on to the 3U size; going up a size might be easier and even cheaper if it means there will be less engineering to meet our requirements. He might be available when we are in Toronto too.
Clyde Space: Unfortunately it took some time before I found one of them, so we only had a short chat. They are also turning more towards turnkey solutions. Talked with Peter JW Anderson. They have another HSI-project ongong, unfortunately I do not remember the name. I will ask for this, and send information on our project if not any of you object. Action: Send information
Surry SSTL: It seems like they have moved towards a bit larger platforms, but we could consider also reaching out to them. I’m a bit confused, because I think there is a satellite lab more connected to the university that is doing CubeSats, Surry SSTL is doing a bit bigger missions. Can consider sending them the same information that Gomspace, Tyvak and Utias have got. Action: Send information
Tyvak: Had a short chat with Jordi Puig-Suari. He said it was a well thought-through decision to move from providing subsystems to provide more turn-key solutions. Did not go into details.
Statssat: Met with Frank-Olaf Sem-Jacobsen. They are now starting to re-write their mission ops.software, taking into account lessons learnt the past few years. I suggest that we invite them and Space Norway to Trondheim to get more insight in their software and methods. I think this might also be relevant in the light of potential cooperation with Kongsberg on Starburst or the IOD-mission. Action: Invite to Trondheim
Planet: I am member of an organization called Space Generation Advisory Council, which is an UN-affiliated organization for students and YPs. Also heavily involved in the IAC program. Anyway; I’m in a working group there and met one of the other members, that works for Planet. He says he handles most visits and guests, and would be able to set up with a meeting (the lab is most likely of limits…). I fear that this will be a bit late now; I don’t think we have time for it in our schedule. A pity I figured out this only now.
Other activities:
Universität Würtzburg: Seems to have some similar activates on integration between UVs and satellites. Will post paper later.
Sky and Space global: The company Gomspace will be making 200 satellites for (Gomspace also landed a new 100 sat agreement the other day, so they will be quite busy). They will set up a new constellation around equator, aiming to get 1 M users of the 3 B people that they claim is un-connected there. This will be narrow band text/SMS, M2M and voice. The claim is that voice is most important for the users, as well as data/text in order to perform financial transactions. From what I understood, they are planning a fully autonomous constellation, where all calls will be routed in space (no gateways/ground stations). Will use S-band between space an ground; a narrow band link which only need an 8 cm antenna on the terminal.