Antrix, the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), has announced that it has signed two launch services agreements with foreign companies. At the end of January, DMC International Imaging (DMCii), the wholly-owned subsidiary of…
Antrix, the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), has announced that it has signed two launch services agreements with foreign companies.
At the end of January, DMC International Imaging (DMCii), the wholly-owned subsidiary of Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL), contracted Antrix for the launch of three DMC-3 earth observation satellites.
Antrix followed this up in February signing an agreement with ST Electronics (Satellite Systems) of Singapore to launch its TeLEOS-1 remote sensing Satellite.
All the launches will use ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) and will take place during 2015.
The PSLV is ISRO’s first operational launch vehicle, capable of lifting 1600kg into 620km sun-synchronous polar orbit, or 1050kg into geo-synchronous transfer orbit.
The rocket has completed 23 successful flights, launching 64 spacecraft. Its last launch was in July 2013 when it lofted India’s first navigation satellite, IRNSS-1A.
SSTL has used ISRO to launch one of its satellite before. In February 2013, a PSLV launched the STRaND-1 (Surrey Training, Research and Nanosatellite Demonstrator 1) cubesat, dubbed the world’s first ‘phonesat’ as it was partially powered by a Google Nexus One smartphone.
The DMC-3 satellites are part of a deal signed between DMCii and Beijing-based 21AT back in mid-2011.
Under the agreement, 21AT will purchase 100% of the capacity of the three EO satellites over an initial contract period of 7 years. 21AT subsidiary’s BLMIT will then use the data, which provides 1-metre high resolution imagery, to monitor land use and the environmental impact.
The satellites are being manufactured by SSTL under a £110m contract to build, launch and insure the constellation.
TeLEOS-1 is the first satellite being constructed by ST Electronics (Satellite Systems), a joint venture set up in May 2011 between ST Electronics, Nanyang Technological University and DSO National Laboratories.
The satellite weighs approximately 400 kilograms and will operate at a low earth orbit of 500km. It is designed to provide satellite images of 1 metre ground sampling distance from an electro-optics camera with an update rate of 90 minutes.
In early February ST Electronics announced that its subsidiary ST Electronics (Satcom & Sensor Systems) has partnered with Korean EO specialist Satrec Initiative and SPOT Asia, a subsidiary of Airbus’ Spot Image, for the distribution of the satellite’s imagery.
