January 6th saw Elon Musk’s SpaceX launch an extra 49 satellites into his broadband fleet and the first launch of 2022 for the business. The launch, from the Kennedy Space Center at 16.49pm ET, went flawlessly – as did the landing of the rocket’s booster some nine minutes after launch. Falcon 9’s first stage booster […]
A planned January launch of 36 OneWeb broadband satellites has slipped from January to March. Russia’s space corporation Roscosmos says it has adjusted the launch date to March 5th. The last launch was on December 27th 2021 which went as planned. “In accordance with the 2022 launch schedule approved by the state corporation Roscosmos, the […]
CTM, a telecom service provider in Macau, has selected Asia’s premier satellite solutions provider, Asia Satellite Telecommunications Company Limited (AsiaSat) and its subsidiary One Click Go Live (OCGL, formerly known as HERMES Live Technology Limited) to provide a satellite and IP-based total solution that will support CTM’s initiative in creating a ‘Digital Macau’, one of […]
December 18th saw two SpaceX launches; the first, from California saw the successful launch of an additional 52 Starlink satellites from the Vandenberg Airforce Base, meaning that Elon Musk’s broadband constellation now has some 1880 satellites in orbit, and mostly working. The second, from SpaceX’s traditional launch site in Florida, saw the successful placing of […]
India’s Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has won six contracts to launch four foreign commercial satellites. The orders – which came via ISRO’s commercial arm, New Space India – are worth about €132 million in fees for ISRO according to India’s space minister Jitendra Singh. Singh told parliamentarians that from 1999 to date, a total of […]
OneWeb is currently building its satellites at a joint-venture facility it owns with Airbus Space & Defense in Florida. It recently emerged that it is planning to build its second-generation satellites in the UK. Airbus has existing UK manufacturing facilities in Portsmouth and Stevenage. OneWeb has now said that it has no plans to close […]
Bangkok-based mu Space says it can build low Earth orbiting small satellites at just $4 million (€3.55m) each, and thus undercut its rivals which it says cost considerably more. mu Space is already planning to build 200 of its MU-B200 craft which are suitable for delivering 5 Gb/s internet speeds to remote locations. The company […]
Sir Richard Branson-backed Virgin Orbit has taken a 17.5 per cent stake in Earth Observation image company Hypersat, as well as investing in a funding round for Poland-based SatRevolution. Hypersat is already a client of Virgin Orbit and used Virgin’s rocket plane to launch 6 of its Hyperspectral satellites. Poland’s SatRevolution is busy raising cash […]
The likes of Steve Collar, CEO at SES, have heavily criticised the 2021 trend to propose massive satellite constellations. Specifically, Collar had in mind the recent Rwanda proposal, with advice supplied by OneWeb founder Greg Wyler, for 327,230 orbiting satellites in low Earth orbit. Collar, speaking at the Euroconsult World Satellite Business Week in Paris, […]
Arianespace’s much-needed new Ariane 6 rocket will be available for launches in 2022. Arianespace’s CEO Stéphane Israël, speaking at the Euroconsult World Satellite Business Week in Paris, told delegates that the giant rocket would make its full test flight in the second-half of 2022. He was not specific as to when. However, there would be […]