Amazon gears up for NASA satellite data relay demonstration

TAMPA, Fla. — Amazon is preparing to demonstrate data relay services for NASA in the spring using upcoming production satellites for its Project Kuiper broadband constellation.

The company recently completed initial in-orbit demonstrations after deploying a pair of prototype spacecraft last year in low Earth orbit (LEO), a spokesperson for Amazon’s Kuiper Government Solutions (KGS) told SpaceNews.

In the next phase, KGS aims to transmit and receive representative data from a mission operations center created specifically for NASA’s Communication Services Project (CSP) and the Kuiper production satellites Amazon is building in-house.

The company later plans to integrate its optical communications terminal on a LEO satellite bought from another manufacturer to show how a third party could route data through the Kuiper network, rather than wait for their spacecraft to pass a suitable ground station.

“KGS plans to launch and operate the satellite [from a third party] late next year and perform a series of demonstrations to showcase various concepts of operation,” the KGS spokesperson said via email.

United Launch Alliance is slated to launch the first batch of Kuiper production satellites on an Atlas V rocket in the last three months of 2024. Amazon’s multi-billion-dollar launch campaign also includes Arianespace, Blue Origin and SpaceX to help deploy more than 3,200 satellites.

NASA awarded contracts worth a total $278.5 million in June 2022 to KGS and five other companies to demonstrate services that could replace its aging fleet of relay satellites — and address the agency’s future needs.

The other companies with funded Space Act Agreements under the Communication Services Project (CSP) are SpaceX, SES Government Solutions, Telesat U.S. Services, Viasat and Inmarsat Government (now part of Viasat). 

Thomas Kacpura, deputy project manager for CSP at NASA’s Glenn Research Center, recently told SpaceNews that it is preparing to close off the agency’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS) constellation to new users around August to prepare for the shift to commercial players.

Commercial alternatives

SES, which operates constellations in geostationary orbit (GEO) and medium Earth orbit, last month said it had successfully tested a relay link between a MEO satellite and a LEO flight-representative terminal on the ground from Planet, an Earth observation operator.

An SES spokesperson said the company sees the successful demo as a milestone in its efforts to enable interoperable and real-time communication between satellites across various orbits. 

“Particularly for SES, by using our GEO & MEO services, we believe LEO operators will be able to reduce the time taken to deliver information from hours to minutes,” SES said via email, “enabling real-time information to be delivered and decision-making to be taken simultaneously.”

The first SES in-orbit demonstration is currently slated for January, using a LEO spacecraft from Planet.

GEO operator Viasat, which currently provides low-bandwidth L-band relay services to commercial LEO Earth observation satellites, is using CSP to develop a more compact and efficient service, in addition to a high throughput Ka-band capability.

“Viasat is also active in the development of advanced, variable data rate free space optic terminals for even higher data rate missions,” said Michael Maughan, vice president of space and mission systems for Viasat Government Systems.

Viasat’s first in-orbit demo under CSP is slated for March, when the operator plans to test its data relay service with a Blue Origin rocket. In the fall, the company plans to test the service with a LEO spacecraft from Loft Orbital, which buys satellite buses from multiple vendors and outfits them with payloads flown on behalf of customers.

Satellite data relay services promise LEO operators multiple advantages, according to Novaspace (formerly Euroconsult) principal adviser Maxime Puteaux, ranging from real-time data transmission to higher throughput and smaller ground station footprints.

However, these services also require additional hardware on a user’s satellite, adding mass, complexity and extra costs that come on top of any subscription price, Puteaux added, which would need to fit into the customer’s cost structure.

“Governments and defense users are the most likely early adopters but commercial users may materialize too,” he said.

“Like any features/services within the industry, it takes a strong vendor push to reach a turning point where someday the nice to have becomes a must-have.”

While Puteaux sees a need for satellite communication operators to diversify their businesses, he cautioned a “build it, and they will come” business strategy has historically proved challenging for the space industry.

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