Satellite News

Rosetta’s lander Philae has woken up after seven months in hibernation on the surface of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The receipt of signals from Rosetta’s Philae lander on 13 June after 211 days of hibernation marked the start of intense activity. In coordination with its mission partners, ESA teams are working to juggle Rosetta’s flight plan to help with renewed lander science investigations.

Airbus Defence and Space has been selected by OneWeb Ltd. as its industrial partner for the design and manufacturing of its fleet of microsatellites.

LeoSat and Thales Alenia Space announced they have decided to carry on with conducting the feasibility study for LeoSat’s low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation, which will provide high-speed, low-latency, cost-effective broadband services worldwide.

Saft has signed a five-year extension to a framework agreement to supply lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery systems to JSC ISS Reshetnev.

Boeing said it is on contract to build ABS-8, the third all-electric propulsion 702SP (small platform) satellite for ABS, a commercial satellite provider based in Bermuda and Hong Kong. This satellite will expand broadcast and enterprise services to Australia, New Zealand, the Middle East, Russia, South Asia and Southeast Asia.

When NASA launches its next mission on the journey to Mars – a stationary lander in 2016 – the flight will include two CubeSats. This will be the first time CubeSats have flown in deep space. If this flyby demonstration is successful, the technology will provide NASA the ability to quickly transmit status information about the main spacecraft after it lands on Mars.

China plans to send its first full electric propulsion satellite into orbit around 2020, providing broadband communication data transmission to China and neighbouring regions, according to Wang Min, deputy chief designer of the communication satellite, at the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST).

Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. will support Principal Investigator Dr. Philip Christensen at Arizona State University (ASU) to develop the Thermal Emission Imaging System for a NASA mission to study Jupiter’s moon, Europa.