John Gedmark
@Gedmark • 10,615 subscribers
CEO @Astranis. Founder, aerospace engineer. Building real things to solve some of the world’s hardest problems
Videos
Like it or not, Space is now a dangerous neighborhood. It's time to bring back the neighorhood watch. Today we're announcing Perceptor-- our new Space Domain Awareness spacecraft, and our first product line outside of comms. The message we've heard from Space Force these last few years has been loud and clear-- GEO is the most important orbit for military space. But that presents a problem, since there are few companies that can reliably and quickly deploy spacecraft to GEO. And it's not just for the military. The infrastructure operating in GEO provides communications, navigation and other critical services that billions of people rely on. It is well known that China and Russia are now launching spacecraft capable of approaching, inspecting and potentially interfering with other satellites. Based on the flight proven MicroGEO platform Astranis is already flying on orbit today, Perceptor brings monitoring and maneuverability to GEO and other high orbits. When an unfamiliar object begins maneuvering near a critical asset, operators need more than a dot on a screen. They need eyes in the sky they can rely on. Satellites in GEO operate across an enormous area nearly 36,000 kilometers up, that encompasses the entire Earth. Ground-based systems can’t provide the persistent, close-range awareness needed to understand exactly what another spacecraft is doing or why it may be maneuvering near a critical asset. As humanity expands outward from LEO and builds out the infrastructure layer higher up, it needs safety and security in place to protect it. That's why Astranis has answered the call. Ad astra per aspera.
John Gedmark13,963 görüntüleme • 20 gün önce
Astranis is building a new satellite for Taiwan. 🇹🇼 With our customer, Chunghwa Telecom, we will bring Taiwan its first-ever dedicated communications satellite. Chunghwa Telecom is the largest telco in Taiwan, with a market cap of more than $30 billion USD. Independent, secure internet infrastructure has never been more geopolitically important — and because it’s impossible to replicate with LEO constellations or even terrestrial links, it merits some spelling out. Astranis was founded on the belief that access to secure, reliable communications infrastructure is foundational to peace, prosperity, and self-determination. The satellite we’re bringing to Taiwan represents resilience. It will serve as a critical backbone for cellular connectivity, maritime communications, and essential government services across Taiwan. And it will ensure that Chunghwa Telecom’s network remains operational in times of crisis, whether in the face of natural disasters or other disruptions to terrestrial infrastructure. Importantly, Astranis provides more than just a satellite — we give our customers a standalone, dedicated network. A network that can be rapidly deployed and fully spans their geography of choice. With enterprise-grade security, customizability, and deep insights into the configuration and operation of the network. And as an independent piece of infrastructure, it safeguards against geopolitical risks, and is beyond the reach of hostile neighbors. Those are the benefits of having your own, dedicated satellite and network. And that’s why so many customers are choosing Astranis. We at Astranis are honored to be part of this moment, and to have a product that has proven so uniquely needed in today’s world. We look forward to continuing to support Taiwan and its people for many years to come.
John Gedmark202,842 görüntüleme • 1 yıl önce
Today we’re announcing a new product for warfighters and first responders: Astranis Vanguard. A fully air-gapped, rapidly deployable network using a dedicated satellite. In partnership with Persistent Systems, Kymeta, and Satcube. And we’ve demonstrated this capability using an operational, on-orbit satellite asset. Astranis Vanguard offers both defense and commercial customers the ability to quickly and easily spin up a resilient, self‑forming network capable of voice, video, and broadband data. For defense missions, Vanguard allows operators to sustain command‑and‑control and situational awareness in austere or contested environments. Dismounted or mounted teams can deploy mobile terminals to extend connectivity beyond line-of-sight, all without reliance on a central hub or existing infrastructure. For commercial and public safety users, Vanguard offers a method to rapidly restore or extend coverage. First responders can stand up connectivity within minutes after severe weather or wildfires, enabling push‑to‑talk, live drone feeds, and data sharing for incident command. And industrial operators in the energy, mining, rail, and maritime industries can use the system to link remote crews and equipment where cellular access is sparse or unavailable. The live demonstration proved out this capability with: ‣ an operational Astranis satellite in geostationary orbit (GEO), with connectivity managed using the satellite’s onboard software-defined radio ‣ a Mobile Ad-Hoc Network (MANET) with Persistent Systems MPU5 broadband radios, using that network to share video feeds, comms, and IP traffic ‣ Flat-panel user terminals by Satcube (for communications on the pause) and Kymeta (for communications on-the-move), connecting directly to the Astranis satellite to provide backhaul and extend the network beyond line of sight This is real equipment that is already deployed all over the world with warfighters, first responders, and a wide array of enterprise customers. In industries that care about mobility and security like oil & gas. Astranis Vanguard is a big deal. It’s a capability that customers have long asked us for. It was only made possible due to our collaboration with Kymeta, Persistent Systems, and Satcube, and we’re excited to roll it out to our existing and future customers.
John Gedmark74,510 görüntüleme • 10 ay önce
Excited to announce UtilitySat, the world’s first multi-mission geostationary satellite, that we're launching at the end of this year. This is a first of its kind. And a new product line-- providing on-demand connectivity for disaster relief, bridge capacity, and other missions. We started Astranis to build something new: small communications satellites that provide dedicated broadband capacity for our customers. At the end of this year we’re launching four more of them on a dedicated Falcon 9 rocket, with many more to come after that. That launch of four satellites includes one satellite for Peru, two satellites for in-flight connectivity, and a fourth satellite that had been previously kept under wraps. Until now. Introducing UtilitySat, the Swiss Army Knife of satellites This is a new product— the world’s first multi-mission commercial GEO satellite, capable of conducting multiple fully-operational broadband connectivity missions. And it is just the first of many. We’ll plan to launch many UtilitySats in the years to come. UtilitySat can provide connectivity on standard Ku, Ka, and Q/V bands, and has the flexibility to dial in exact frequencies using Astranis’s proprietary ultra-wideband software-defined radio. It can also relocate dozens of times around the GEO belt over its lifetime. It does this using our unique on-board dual-propulsion architecture, which includes both a chemical monopropellant system and an electric ion thruster. A new mission every year, or every month When we first began development of UtilitySat almost 2 years ago, we had many different missions in mind. UtilitySat can serve as bridge capacity for a customer that is waiting for a dedicated satellite, as an on-orbit spare, or as extra, surge capacity that can be brought in to supplement the broadband service we’re providing to one of our customers. There are acute needs as well — a natural disaster can wipe out terrestrial connectivity over a huge geographic area. One of the top priorities for first responders and during disaster relief is reliable comms on the ground. With multiple UtilitySats on orbit, Astranis can bring in extra capacity on incredibly short notice. Capacity that is compatible with existing, low-cost GEO ground terminals. In initial conversations with customers for UtilitySat, we’ve seen huge demand — these customers often want to lease the entire capacity of the satellite once they learn what UtilitySat can offer. Customers need all the capacity they can get, and new capacity that can be deployed on short notice is a huge deal and a huge departure from traditional GEO satellites. We see a future where customers will be able to call up extra capacity on demand to augment their existing capacity needs, and we’re making that future a reality. US Government applications The first UtilitySat mission will be a commercial one, but we are seeing enormous demand from both from commercial companies and from our government customers. The US Government has unique needs — Combatant Commanders need to be able to task dedicated satellites to specific AORs at a moment’s notice — and surge communications would give them a new tool in their toolbox, helping them win even in a contested environment. And more broadly speaking our military leaders have said the one priority in national security space is to add resiliency to our fleets, using larger numbers of smaller, flexible, and maneuverable satellites so we’re not dependent on just a handful of huge satellites in GEO. UtilitySat shows that Astranis can do just that. Not traditional GEO satellites UtilitySat is only possible because of Astranis’s unique technology — including our proprietary software–defined radio. The flexibility of having on-board digital signal processing allows us to build a standardized satellite design, and move a lot of what used to be done in hardware, into software. UtilitySat uses the standard Astranis MicroGEO platform, adding more frequency bands and some new software capabilities to make maximum use of the available spectrum, no matter where the satellite is on orbit. Traditional geostationary satellites are designed to sit in one orbital slot for up to 20 years, with a set of frequency bands that is hardwired in at the factory. Their single mission must be predetermined many years before they are launched. Astranis does not build traditional GEO satellites. From day one we knew there had to be a better way, and we’re doing it.
John Gedmark122,069 görüntüleme • 3 yıl önce
Huge update from Astranis Mission Control: all four Block 2 satellites have successfully completed initial commissioning and are now headed to GEO using their on board ion thrusters. This is a huge deal. Here are some highlights from our first week and half on orbit: - Nominal deployment in our target orbit: 400km x 65,000km x 12.5 deg inclination (thank you SpaceX) - All pre-separation logic and separation autonomy worked perfectly, and all autonomous deployments (solar arrays, ion thruster gimbals, and secondary antenna reflectors) successfully completed - Checkouts of thermal management systems, power subsystems, software, and GNC - Reaction wheel, SADA, and monopropellant thruster commissioning - Monoprop detumble and transition to fine pointing control using reaction wheels and star trackers - Sun-pointing mode achieved for maximum power generation - High rate TTC downlink and download of onboard data - Subreflector boom deployment and verification via photodiode telemetry - Ion thruster gimbal commissioning, demonstrating successful gimbal deployment - Simultaneous command of all 5 Astranis satellites, using 9 different ground stations across 4 continents - 100% successful deployments: all solar arrays, booms, gimbals, reflectors, splashplates — 60x total hold down release mechanism deployments without issue - Test-fired and characterized all 8 monoprop thrusters on all 4 satellites (32x thrusters total) - Commissioned the Electric Propulsion (EP) system, including successfully test-firing each satellite's ion thruster - Conducted an initial payload checkout on all 4 vehicles— the Software-Defined Radios, RF front end electronics, high-power amplifiers (TWTAs), and LNAs have all been checked out and are performing nominally - Executed long-duration EP burns on all four vehicles, and have beginning orbit raises to GEO from our current GTO orbits In short: the satellites are working great and are on their way to GEO where they will start their missions for our customers. All of our hard work — designing, testing, manufacturing, and operating — is paying off. LET’S GO.
John Gedmark64,203 görüntüleme • 1 yıl önce
Daha fazla içerik yok.