Military/Aerospace Electronics

ispace, the lunar transportation specialist, is partnering with Orbit Fab, the “Gas Stations in Space” service provider, to develop new refuelling systems for spacecraft, to support future lunar exploration missions. The companies have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to co-operate on creating new methods for using fuel in outer space. For example, they aim to use resources such as ...

The UK Space Agency has awarded Raytheon a contract to provide Space Surveillance and Tracking Services Data (SST) from low-Earth orbit (LEO). Specifically, Raytheon NORSS – Raytheon’s UK-based space domain awareness specialist- will be using Raytheon’s LOCI (LEO Optical Camera Installation) sensor network to track “Resident Space Objects”. Such objects include space debris, defence assets and commercial satellites, to better ...

SaxaVord, in the the Shetland Islands, has been officially granted a spaceport licence by UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). The site – on the Lamba Ness peninsula site in Unst, on the northerly coast of the islands – becomes the UK’s first licensed vertical launch spaceport as Spaceport Cornwall was previously licensed for horizontal launches using rockets from a modified ...

Adroit, a market research specialist, has released a report on the projected size of the global commercial satellite imaging market, 2021 to 2031. It calculates a CAGR of 7.6 % during 2021-2031. With the market for satellite imaging valued at $3.8bn in 2022, it will have doubled to reach a value of $7.0bn in 2031 As you would expect, North ...

True Anomaly, a Denver-based space security startup, has raised $100 million in Series B funding. The investment round was led by Riot Ventures and also involved Eclipse, ACME Capital, Menlo Ventures, Narya, 645 Ventures, Rocketship.vc, Champion Hill Ventures, and FiveNine Ventures. The company, which develops hardware and software systems for space domain awareness, says it will enable further “investment in ...

The Irish government has awarded funding of €7.9 million to the Ireland-based National Space Subsystems and Payloads Initiative (NSSPI) consortium. The investment was made through its Disruptive Technologies Innovation Fund (DTIF), and the Dublin-based Ubotica – a space AI specialist – is among the members of the group. The grant will be invested in the consortium’s development of space technology ...

A government body which creates secret technologies to support national security – His Majesty’s Government Communications Centre (HMGCC) – has launched an initiative to work more openly with technology firms and academics. HMGCC is based at Hanslope Park near Milton Keynes and is described by the government as a centre of national security engineering excellence. The new commercial initiative is ...

The UK government has announced Enabling Technologies Programme (ETP) funding for a range of projects designed to help boost UK development of new space technologies. Twenty-three projects are involved and, in total, the UK government funding is £4 million. This is made up of £3.2 million from the UK Space Agency (UKSA) with £800,000 contributed by the Science and Technology ...

Aalyria has won a development contract with the European Space Agency (ESA) to deploy Spacetime – its O-RAN compliant “network orchestration” technology – at the agency’s ECSAT 5G/6G Hub in Harwell, Oxfordshire. The goal is to “unlock new 5G/6G Terrestrial (TN) and Non-Terrestrial Network (NTN) capabilities,” say the two parties, and Aalyria – a spin out from Google – is ...

Spire Global, the space services specialist, has been awarded a contract by Lacuna Space, a satellite IoT provider, to build and operate six satellites for a dedicated IoT constellation, all of which will be made in Glasgow. Under the agreement, Spire will build and launch the spacecraft, which will be carrying Lacuna Space’s payload and antenna. The companies say there ...