Post Production Technology News

Smaller satellites on the up

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 10:55

Northern Sky Research (NSR) reports that when the UK Government announced its support to finance half of SSTL’s newest radar satellite, it confirmed a recent trend - smaller satellites are gaining ground in both optical and SAR (search and rescue) markets.

According to NSR, as more manufacturers look to address this market with finer ground resolution and smaller satellites at a lower cost (£200 million for four 300 kg. SSTL radar satellites), the effect is likely to be a reduction in the cost of data at the end user side.

The NSR report states: “In the optical realm, small satellites weighing 300 kg today can offer 70% to 80% of the capabilities of a traditional commercial EO satellite. These can also offer download speeds and an onboard memory of a 1-ton satellite launched for 10 years. It is a well-known fact in the industry that imagery prices fall at the same time as resolution gets better. For example, the cost of two metre PAN optical data has decreased by more than half since 2001. Even if radar data is still more expensive, the decrease is already showing in the low and medium resolution end of the market. This is now a global requirement. As small satellites (less than 500 kg) are getting cheaper to produce and launch, their numbers are expected to surpass medium and heavy satellites in the next 10 years.

“The aim of the British government is openly stated: bring down the cost of data to reach a wider set of potential customers with smaller and cheaper satellites, and it starts at the hardware level. The end result is that a game changing process could well be underway in the EO market with manufacturers such as SSTL, IAI, NEC, and MDA who address this issue. If they are successful, it will mean that mass is part of the equation for the EO data market to expand.”

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