27 October 2002
Satcoms
Kingston inmedia Takes Horse Racing to the Caribbean
Texas Department of
Health Selects Gilat Network
Earth
Observation
NIMA Selects Boeing Autometric to Process Elevation Data Collected
by the Space Shuttle
Tracking Elephants from Space
Manned
Space
Space the Ultimate
Visitor Destination
Launch
Services
Harris
Corporation Signs Licensing Agreement with Iridium for OS/COMET Network Control
System
ViaSat
Selected by ITT Industries for Spacelift Range System Antennas
Business
Com Dev Exercises SkyBridge Early Purchase Option
Products and Services
A New LNB from Swedish Microwave
Harris Corporation
Releases Addition to OS/COMET Network Control Software Product Suite
SkyStream’s
Mediaplex 20 Video Services Router Achieves NEBS Level 3
Certification
People
Spacehab CEO Announces Retirement
Kingston inmedia Takes Horse Racing to the Caribbean
(21 October 2002)
Kingston inmedia has won a renewed contract to downlink and distribute horse
racing for Satellite Information Services Ltd (SIS Ltd) via a combination of
satellite and fibre services for a further three years.
The agreement will see Kingston inmedia downlink a feed of the racing action
from the Sirius 2 satellite and provide distribution services via transatlantic
fibre to Philadelphia Park in Pennsylvania. The service will then be turned
around and live pictures and commentary of the races will be broadcast by
satellite to betting shops in the Caribbean.
SIS Ltd is one of the
most prolific producers of live television in the UK, with more than 9000 hours
of live programmes per year. SIS is received in virtually all UK and Eire
betting shops, together with 300 outlets in Western Europe - a total of 9,500.
It is also broadcast to betting outlets in the Caribbean and other parts of the
world.
Texas Department of Health Selects Gilat Network
(23 October 2002)
Spacenet Inc, has been selected by the Texas Department of Health (TDH) to
provide a high-speed satellite communications network. The network will support
interactive data applications and interactive distance learning (IDL) services
to 520 offices throughout the state.
TDH will use
Gilat's Skystar Advantage VSAT network for its Bureau of Nutrition's Women,
Infants and Children (WIC) program, which provides food benefits and nutrition
education to individuals at nutritional risk as defined by the US Department of
Agriculture. The VSAT data network is designed to enable WIC to more
efficiently transmit clients' demographic and benefits issuance data to the WIC
central office in Austin, TX. The network's IDL capabilities are intended to
enable WIC to improve and expand its staff training program to remote
locations, thus reducing travel costs and eliminating time out of the
office.
NIMA Selects Boeing Autometric to Process Elevation Data
Collected by the Space Shuttle
(21 October 2002) Boeing Autometric has received a US$
16.6 million contract from the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) to
produce topographic data collected during a space shuttle mission.
Boeing Autometric is a unit of Boeing Integrated Defense
Systems, a part of The Boeing Compny.
The Shuttle Radar Topography
Mission (SRTM) flew on NASA's Space Shuttle Endeavor in February 2000. The data
collected from this mission contains the most detailed height measurements ever
gathered of planet Earth.
Working in conjunction with NIMA, Boeing
Autometric will provide the software and direct support to complete more than
8,000 cells (each being one degree of latitude by one degree of longitude in
size) of radar data, equivalent to nearly one terabyte of information. When the
SRTM program is complete, NIMA will have the most detailed and accurate
elevation data ever compiled for 80% of the world's landmass.
Boeing
Autometric has been responsible for project management and client
co-ordination, as well as developing the interactive editing system interface
and digital elevation model editing tools, part of the technology incorporated
from Boeing Autometric's Softplotter software. A team of 50 operators,
including subcontractors, will perform the team's share of the production work,
which will result in data covering three complete continents and sections of
two others.
Tracking Elephants from Space
(21 October 2002) DigitalGlobe QuickBird satellite
imagery is helping researchers of the Amboseli Elephant Research Project (AERP)
to locate elephants in Kenya's Amboseli National Park and surrounding
ecosystem.
Armed with the ability to track elephant
movements within and outside the park from space, AERP researchers can learn
more about the elephants' social interactions and better understand shifts in
their use of the Amboseli ecosystem.
Geographic Information Systems
(GIS) software technology from ESRI (Redlands, California) is helping AERP
maintain a 30-year database of information about the Amboseli elephant
populations and their habitats.
The 61-centimeter resolution of
QuickBird imagery, which has allowed AERP researchers to distinguish the
current location and size of individual elephant groups, may provide valuable
insight about the evolution of elephant behaviour and the complex ways in which
the animals respond to changes in their environment.
Dr Cynthia Moss,
director of the Amboseli National Park and co-founder of the AERP and her team
of researchers have been collecting spatial data for years. In 1972 when Moss
initiated the project on the Amboseli elephant population, Moss used paper maps
and hand-written notes and data sheets to collect data and analyse changes to
the park's ecosystem. For several years, the data was transferred to computer
coding forms and finally to computers, a time-consuming and cumbersome process.
Today, digital technologies such as QuickBird satellite imagery and GIS
complement Moss' fieldwork and enable her and her team to easily collect,
categorise and analyse data.
Since its inception in 1972, AERP has
monitored the Amboseli elephants, collecting data on all births, deaths,
sightings and behaviour, and has assembled identity records for each of the
elephants in the population. This represents a wealth of data made possible
only by such a long-term study of a relatively undisturbed, free-ranging
population of African elephants. As a result, AERP is a critical source of
baseline data on elephants. AERP was founded by Dr Cynthia Moss and Dr Harvey
Croze.
Space the Ultimate Visitor Destination
(21 October 2002)
TraveLogia.com has become the world's first full service online travel site to
provide travel bookings to the ultimate visitor destination - outer space.
TraveLogia.com and Space Adventures Ltd. have formed a
strategic marketing agreement to provide once-in-a-lifetime space experiences.
Beginning Monday, October 21, 2002, TraveLogia.com's free online members will
have access to Space Adventures' zero gravity and supersonic high-altitude jet
flights, world-wide expeditions and space flight experiences.
Anyone
can register for free at TraveLogia.com. All free online members
(18-years-or-older) receive a free 3-day, 2-night hotel vacation plus over US$
1,000 in travel savings when they register and receive free booking access to
TraveLogia.com.
TraveLogia.com members can now book and participate in
any of the following Space Adventures' programs:
Shuttle Launch Tours:
With a US astronaut as host, TraveLogia.com travel shoppers can experience the
thrill of a live countdown and launch at the Kennedy Space Center in
Florida.
Zero-Gravity Flights: Participants can float weightlessly
just like the astronauts at the formerly top secret Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut
Training Center in Star City, Russia.
Edge of Space Flights: Expert
test pilots take participants aboard a MiG- 25 supersonic jet to a speed of
over two and one half times the speed of sound (Mach 2.5) and above 80,000
feet, where one can see the curvature of the Earth and the blackness of
space.
Sub-Orbital Space Flights: Space Adventures will offer
TraveLogia.com members a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to go to space!
Participants will be able to climb aboard a sub-orbital spacecraft and fly to
an altitude of 100 km, experience several minutes of weightlessness and see the
planet from space. Flights are planned for 2004-2005.
Harris Corporation Signs Licensing Agreement with Iridium for
OS/COMET Network Control System
(22 October 2002) Harris Corporation has signed a
licensing agreement with Iridium Satellite LLC for long-term use of the Harris
OS/COMET satellite command and control system, an advanced satellite telemetry
tracking and command (TT&C) solution that features commercial off-the-shelf
(COTS) design and high levels of flexibility.
The
agreement gives Iridium the right to use OS/COMET for the life of the Iridium
satellite network, and provides options for use of future upgrades to
OS/COMET.
OS/COMET's advanced architecture and features have allowed
Iridium to automate the command and control of its constellation of satellites
so that only two operators are required to control the entire fleet.
Designed for government and commercial applications, OS/COMET is used to
support both single-satellite missions, and the largest and most complex
satellite networks deployed today, including Iridium. OS/COMET's open
architecture enables users to grow and maintain an OS/COMET system without the
need for additional software or services from the COTS provider.
OS/COMET v4.2, the newest version of the product, incorporates the latest
satellite command and control technology while maintaining the proven OS/COMET
architecture which has the capability of flying large and diverse fleets of
satellites with multiple mission types and platforms.
ViaSat Selected by ITT Industries for Spacelift Range System
Antennas
(24
October 2002) ViaSat Inc has been awarded a contract in excess of US$ 9 million
by ITT Industries to provide the telemetry antenna systems for the Spacelift
Range System (SLRS) program.
ITT Industries was awarded
the prime contract from the Air Force in November of 2000 to provide a major
modernisation of the Eastern and Western launch ranges instrumentation. This
initial antenna contract provides for a total of 15 antenna systems to be
manufactured, tested and installed at various sites on each range by ViaSat
Satellite Ground Systems.
The SLRS consists of ground based
surveillance, metric tracking, communications, control and display, command and
weather systems centred at Patrick Air Force Base, Florida, and Vandenberg AFB,
California, that support space launch missions. The goal is to provide DoD,
NASA and commercial customers a highly reliable, integrated system to support
spacecraft launch plus ballistic missile and other aeronautical
testing.
ZY-2
Launched: 27 October 2002
Site: Taiyuan, Shanxi province, China
Launcher: Long March-4B
Orbit: LEO
International Number: 2002-049A
Name: ZY-2
ZY-2 is a Chinese Earth resources satellite.
Com
Dev Exercises SkyBridge
Early Purchase Option
(21 October 2002) Com Dev International is in
discussion with Technology Horizons Limited (THL) regarding the exercise of an
early purchase option under the agreement between Com Dev, THL and a subsidiary
of THL to purchase units in the SkyBridge Limited Partnership held by such
subsidiary.
THL is disputing Com Dev's right to exercise
such option and Com Dev has therefore determined to seek an interpretation of
the agreement by way of application to court. Given that Com Dev is seeking
interpretation of this agreement, there can be no certainty that the position
Com Dev has taken will prevail.
The early purchase option that Com Dev
is proposing to exercise provides that Com Dev may purchase the units at any
time after Com Dev's common shares trade for a period in excess of 60 days at a
market price of more than Cdn$ 12. Trades above such price occurred during the
period from September 25, 2000 to February 20, 2001. The applicable purchase
price for the units is 1,926,372 common shares of Com Dev. The 1,926,372 shares
to be issued are included in the fully diluted share calculation in Com Dev
financials. To meet all requirements of the CBCA with regard to conflicts of
interest, a special committee comprised only of non-conflicted members of Com
Dev's Board was delegated responsibility to review and determine Com Dev's
position in this matter. With respect to its financial statements, Com Dev's
ownership position in the SkyBridge Limited Partnership will be non-material
and will not result in any balance sheet consolidation.
A New
LNB from Swedish
Microwave
(25
October 2002) Swedish Microwave are extending the commercial product range with
a new light Single Band LNB in a complete new design. The LNB meets the
requests from the market and main applications are Broadband via satellite,
VSAT systems and Commercial satellite headends.
The
extremely Low phase noise ensures the lowest possible BER (Bit Error Rate). As
standard Low Noise figure, F-connector and 2 Year Warranty. As option available
with N- or SMA-connector, High stability LO, Customised gain or customised
specification by request.
All Swedish Microwave's LNBs are
individually hand tuned to get the very best performance available for each
unit. Quality and long term reliability is also essential. Therefore are all
LNBs tested according to a very extensive test program, which includes heating,
cooling, water-proof testing and rigorous electrical testing.
Harris
Corporation Releases
Addition to OS/COMET Network Control Software Product Suite
(22 October 2002)
Harris Corporation has announced the release of the newest addition to its
OS/COMET product suite for satellite Telemetry Tracking and Command (TT&C).
The new OS/COMET Archival and Retrieval Tool (AR/Tool) enables satellite
operators and engineers to quickly find archived satellite data, operator
actions, command histories, alarms and other data, and to logically correlate
the data for reports or further analysis.
OS/COMET is an
advanced software tool set featuring commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) design and
high levels of flexibility. Designed for government and commercial
applications, it is used to support both single-satellite missions and the
largest and most complex satellite networks deployed today, including Iridium,
GPS and the fleet of 16 spacecraft flown from the US Navy Space Operations
Command (NAVSOC).
OS/COMET also features a suite of "bolt-on" products
- now including AR/Tool - that provides enhanced capabilities such as
operations automation, ground equipment control, automated fault resolution,
spacecraft simulation, and TT&C functionality via a PC client.
AR/Tool significantly increases the OS/COMET's product suite functionality by
providing an intuitive and easy-to-use archival and retrieval graphical user
interface (GUI), combined with the power of a relational database system.
AR/Tool's design enables the user to configure the tool to meet their specific
archival concept of operations.
AR/Tool is fully configurable by the
user and can be set up to meet each customer's unique archiving operating
procedures. The platform's independent GUI provides an interface to OS/COMET's
powerful archiving and retrieval system. AR/Tool introduces direct archiving to
a customer-specified rational database management system (RDBMS), providing
rapid retrieval of specific data based on user-specified search criteria. It
provides the user with a quick-look plot of the requested data for analysis or
data assurance. The output can be a fully configured for generating reports in
AR/Tool or data files that can be easily imported into COTS or custom data
analysis software. AR/Tool's design provides the power of an RDBMS while not
impacting the real-time system's performance. AR/Tool also supports the
management of both short-term and long-term data storage.
AR/Tool v1.0
is being offered to current OS/COMET v4.x users as part of HTSC's standard COTS
maintenance agreement. HTSC's COTS maintenance agreements provide customers
with standard software maintenance services and the option to receive
enhancements to the functionality of the OS/COMET product suite. HTSC provides
all OS/COMET users with the same baseline product, allowing them the option to
accept enhancements to the product's functionality over the life of their
program. In addition, the common COTS baseline approach enables HTSC to provide
consistent documentation and maintenance support throughout the life of any
satellite program.
SkyStream’s Mediaplex 20 Video Services Router Achieves NEBS
Level 3 Certification
(25 October 2002) SkyStream Networks' Mediaplex 20
Video Services Router has achieved Network Equipment Building Standard (NEBS)
Level 3 Certification, making the platform immediately available for fast
deployment into carrier networks.
To become certified at
NEBS Level 3, a product must meet strict physical, electrical and environmental
requirements to prove it will operate safely and reliably within carrier
infrastructures. It must pass an extensive series of tests designed to evaluate
network equipment in a variety of possible conditions including extreme
temperatures; high vibration; airborne contaminants; electromagnetic
interference; electrostatic discharge levels and electrical safety. Carriers
and many large service providers in the U.S. require NEBS Level 3 Compliance
before deploying networking products in their central office environments.
Established by Regional Bell Operating Company and Telcordia, NEBS Level 3
Certification will accelerate the deployment of SkyStream’s Mediaplex 20
into carrier networks at a time when service providers need to be more
efficient, multi-service networks world-wide.
Mediaplex 20, is the
industry’s first all-inclusive platform for carriers and service providers
to deliver advanced video services to consumers and businesses over existing
broadband networks. The platform’s wide range of video and data processing
capabilities and broadcast level security architecture, enable service
providers to bring broadcast, on demand and interactive television services to
market faster and more cost-effectively, with security, than currently
available solutions.
Spacehab CEO Announces Retirement
(24 October 2002) Spacehab Inc has announced
the planned retirement of its Chief Executive Officer, Dr Shelley Harrison, to
occur on March 31, 2003. Dr Harrison will then continue as the non-executive
Chairman of the Board of Directors and Michael E Kearney, Spacehab President
and Chief Operating Officer, will assume the role of Chief Executive
Officer.
As Spacehab's first venture capital space
investor and strategic planner, Dr Harrison successfully raised over US$ 200
million through a multi-year sequence of private and public equity and debt
financings underwriting the build of its unique asset base of modules and
pallets and acquisitions of Astrotech Space Operations and Johnson Engineering
to broaden its market positioning and revenue base.
Dr Harrison has
been a member of the Company's Board of Directors since 1987 becoming the
Chairman in August 1993. He then assumed the role of Chief Executive Officer in
April 1996 after completion of Spacehab's initial public offering, the first
successful initial public offering of a human space company.
Dr.
Harrison gradually reorganised the Company from its development phase into its
position of leadership supporting NASA and the international space agencies,
utilising privately owned, shuttle-based assets and flexible commercial
processes. Spacehab has now flown 17 successful space missions and has become a
unique participant in the world's largest international space science
endeavour, the International Space Station.
