Spaced-OoooO-Out ::

A nice article this week at the BBC on the continuing development of low cost technology from Surrey Satellite Technology Limited, the high tech, low cost, British satellite development company that is now owned by EADS Astrium. Current sights are set on the high spatial resolution (<1m) sector which has been largely “owned” by US commercial companies. SSTL reckons that they can develop a satellite at ~0.6m resolution for ~$70M, rather than the ~$500 it normally takes. This would reduce the unit cost from $20km2 to $0.15km2. That would really shake up the market!

The satellite coverage of the US presidential inauguration was interesting, but with US regulators restricting resolution to 0.5m, GeoEye wasn’t able to offer the full 0.41m resolution. Clearly there is the potential to compete by offering higher resolutions which US companies can’t offer. It will be interesting to see whether these restrictions are relaxed.