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November 2020 Worldwide Satellite Magazine

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November 2020 Worldwide Satellite Magazine Worldwide Satellite Magazine SatMagazineSatMagazine November 2020 Cover image is couresy of Spacechips. CONNECTING YOU TO THE FUTURE SMALL PACKAGE. 1.35M FIT BIG GAIN. FLEXIBLE INTEGRATED TERMINAL ARSTRAT KA-BAND CERTIFICATION COMPUTER ASSISTED SATCAP MANUAL POINTING OR AUTO-AQUISITION BUILT-IN TUNER & BEACON RECEIVER TRI-BAND X, KU AND WIDEBAND KA FEEDS WITH QUICK CHANGE RF KITS MODULAR & FLEXIBLE MODEM, BUC & LNB OPTIONS SCALABLE: 75CM, 98CM & 1.35M SET-UP BY ONE PERSON IN MINUTES LIGHTWEIGHT IATA-COMPLIANT avltech.comCHECKABLE CASES avltech.com ENABLING YOUR AMBITIONS TO REACH THEIR TARGET Ariane 6 by 2020 Vega C by 2020 Customer-tailored for versatility, reliability, competitiveness. Publishing Operations Senior Columnists This Issue’s Authors Silvano Payne, Publisher + Executive Writer Chris Forrester, Broadgate Publications Rajan Bedi Will Mudge Simon Payne, Chief Technical Officer Karl Fuchs, iDirect Government Services Matteo L. Bemposti Brian O’Toole Hartley G. Lesser, Editorial Director Bob Gough, Goonhilly Earth Station John Dahlia Dr. Anthony Penderis Pattie Lesser, Executive Editor Rebecca M. Cowen-Hirsch, Inmarsat Mark Donaghy Greg Quiggle Donald McGee, Production Manager Ken Peterman, Viasat Joakim Espeland Daniel Smith Andy Bernard, Sales Director Giles Peeters, Track24 Defence Semir Hassanaly James Trevelyan Teresa Sanderson, Operations Director Koen Willems, ST Engineering Newtec John Innes Jean-Claude Tshipama Sean Payne, Business Development Director Dan Makinster, Technical Advisor Features Advertiser Index Advantech Wireless Technologies, Inc. .7 “New Space” Leads a Path on the Ground as well as in Space: . .8 How EO + GSaaS are Driving the Dynamic Ground Segment Transformation . AvL Technologies . .2 by Greg Quiggle, Kratos Arabsat Satellite . .31 European Union to Seek Pan-European Broadand-by-Satellite System? . .10 by Chris Forrester, Senior Contributor Arianespace . .3 Executive Spotlight: Grant Bonin, Spaceflight Inc. .18 Comtech EF Data . .13 First-To-Know Insights Fuel Geospatial Opportunities . .24 By Brian O’Toole, BlackSky CPI Satcom Products . .21 Satellite Economics are Changing… the Future of Cellular Backhaul . .28 Gilat Satellite Networks . .23 By James Trevelyan, Speedcast Will 5G and LEO Deliver Better Remote Connectivity? . .32 Integrasys . .6 By Will Mudge, Speedcast Kratos Defense & Security Solutions . .9 A Conversation with Manik Vinnakota, Telesat . .34 Wavelength: Overcoming the Digital Drought . .36 Leonardo DRS . .25 By SSPI ND Satcom Products GmbH . .15 Africa Needs the Space Industry to go Forward . .38 By Dr. Anthony Penderis, AARSE RF-Design . .17 Connectivity in Africa . .42 Russian Satellite Communications Company (RSCC) . .37 By Jean-Claude Tshipama, Konnect Africa Satnews Digital Editions . .41 SWIR Imaging in Space . .44 By Mark Donaghy, Raptor Photonics SmallSat Symposium . .69 Innovation: 3D Printed Smallsat Deployer . .46 SpaceBridge . .19 By Matteo Levoni Bemposti, CRP Technology Why Investment is Critical for Satellite Innovation . .48 Spaceflight Laboratory (SFL) . .5 By Joakim Espeland, QuadSAT W.B. Walton Enterprises, Inc. .Cover Satellite Antenna Diversity . .50 Remote Connectivity—Striking the Correct Business Case . .52 XMW, Inc. .27 By Semir Hassanaly, ST Engineering iDirect Executive Spotlight: Marc Bell, Raptor Photonics . .54 SatMagazine is published 11 times a year by Satnews Publishers, 800 Siesta Way, Scottish Space Leadership . .58 Sonoma, CA, 95476 — USA. Phone: (707) 939-9306 / Fax: (707) 939-9235 © 2020 Satnews Publishers By John Innes, SSLC, and Daniel Smith, AstroAgency We reserve the right to edit all submitted materials to meet publication content The Story of West Virginia’s First Spacecraft . .62 guidelines, as well as for grammar and spelling errors, or to move articles to an By John Dahlia, TMC Technologies alternative issue to accommodate publication space requirements, or remove content due to space restrictions or unacceptable content. Submission of articles does not Maintaining the Production of Electronics Post COVID-19 . .66 constitute acceptance of said material by Satnews Publishers. Edited materials may, or may not, be returned to author and/or company for review prior to publication. The By Rajan Bedi, Spacechips views expressed in Satnews Publishers’ various publications do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of Satnews Publishers. All rights reserved. All included imagery is United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur—Forthcoming . .70 courtesy of, and copyright to, the respective companies and/or named individuals. SatMagazine Page 4 November 2020 SPACE FLIGHT LABORATORY MICROSATS, NANOSATS & CUBESATS DISTINCT MISSIONS LAUNCHED, UNDER CONSTRUCTION OR READY TO LAUNCH GHGSat-C1 Sept. 2, 2020 NEMO-HD Sept. 2, 2020 HawkEye 360 Pathfinder Dec. 3, 2018 ...AND COUNTING Space Flight Laboratory (SFL) provides bigger returns from smaller satellites at lower cost. We are developing innovative and budget-aggressive satellites and constellations today for tomorrow’s NewSpace applications in Earth observation, maritime monitoring, communications, and environmental sensing. PIONEERING AND OPERATIONAL MISSIONS COMMERCIAL AND GOVERNMENT APPLICATIONS YEARS Phone: 1-416-667-7400 University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies Twitter: @SFL_SmallerSats Email: info@utias-sfl.net Toronto, Ontario, Canada Web: www.utias-sfl.net “New Space” Leads a Path on the Ground as well as in Space: How EO + GSaaS are Driving the Dynamic Ground Segment Transformation" By Greg Quiggle, Vice President, Product Management, Kratos When the wave of New Space and smallsat players came on the For the GSaaS and cloud providers, however, some of the ground scene a few years ago, they brought a new set of priorities to trends encountered by the smallsat, EO and LEO pioneers had to go the ground segment with them. After all, you can’t spend a even further— lower operating costs, greater automation and, most million dollars on a ground station that supports a single, importantly, the ability to repurpose ground system components on the $200,000 satellite. fly from one mission to the next, one satellite to the next, again and again and again. It wasn’t just about dollars and cents, it was about operating with fewer The transformation on the ground that started with smallsat and people, not to mention that the people you have may not be ground cloud operators is working today, remaking the old paradigm of systems experts. It was also about smaller footprint systems that could purpose-built, hardware-based, often proprietary systems designed for be mobile and software-based and turnkey wherever possible. bent pipe, fixed payload content delivery model, to dynamic, Fast forward and another wave of innovation hit the industry, cloud- automated and intelligent operations that can adapt in real-time to enabled ground services. Companies such as Microsoft and KSAT changing conditions and multiple missions, even multiple orbits. introduced highly scalable, dynamic ground services to support Earth Observation (EO) and imaging organizations that are applying all The Rise of Dynamic Ground manner of remote sensor data to everything from maritime, energy, A dynamic ground system is one that can support end-to-end service agriculture and defense. delivery for multiple missions and adapt — on the fly — to changing As a small company, why own a ground system at all when you may demand, supply and threat. In fact, it can support multiple missions only need it a few hours a day when your satellite passes over one or simultaneously by repurposing ground system resources as needed, two antennas? Much better to subscribe to a Ground Station-as-a- ultimately even supporting the ability to roam across multiple satellite Service (GSaaS) where an experienced cloud operator can offer more networks, one of the high priorities in the defense sector. antennas, better placement, endless storage and cloud processing, as well as higher levels of security and expert technicians on demand. SatMagazine Page 8 November 2020 "$ * !(%#!& $*$%$%!! Introducing OpenSpace from Kratos, the first software-defined ground system. With OpenSpace, ground functions that once took weeks to implement manually now take minutes, making systems more agile and able to respond to changes in demand, threat and supply instantly. + $% %%#'$! + )&% &$% "!* %$ +&%!%!")%(!#! ,&#%! $ + &%$%%&%!#%"#%! $ OpenSpace is a giant leap forward in enterprise-grade satellite ground network technology that # $' $ $!%(#, %(!# %!$&""!#%$%%!"#%!#$ %'!' dynamic space. READY FOR WHAT’S NEXT™ Learn more at www.KratosDefense.com/OpenSpace In order to support dynamic ground, however, operations must first shift to become digital and virtual. Working directly with analog RF signals in the traditional model just won’t keep up with the speed, flexibility and scaling needs of highly configurable, software-defined payloads capable of servicing thousands of users by changing beams, power, capacity and frequency. Or, consider the mega-constellations aiming to launch multi-band platforms comprised of thousands of high- throughput satellites in LEO and MEO orbits. Figure 2. As network infrastructure advances from a legacy hardware architecture, operators realize increasing advantages in scalability, flexibility and performance. How Dynamic Ground Operates Virtualization — the conversion of hardware components such as modems or combiners into software functions — is the first step toward dynamic ground operations as it aims to move ground system
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