space
Auto Added by WPeMatico
Pixxel closes $7.3M seed round and unveils commercial hyperspectral imaging product
LA and Bangalore-based space startup Pixxel has closed a $7.3 million seed round, including newly committed capital from Techstars, Omnivore VC and more. The company has also announced a new product focus: hyperspectral imaging. It aims to provide that imaging at the highest resolution commercially available, via a small satellite constellation that will provide 24-hour global coverage once it’s fully operational.
Pixxel’s funding today is an extension of the $5 million it announced it had raised back in August of last year. At the time, the startup had only revealed that it was focusing on Earth imaging, and it’s unveiling its specific pursuit of hyperspectral imaging for the first time today. Hyperspectral imaging uses far more light frequencies than the much more commonly used multispectral imaging used in satellite observation today, allowing for unprecedented insight and detection of previously invisible issues, including migration of pest insect populations in agriculture, or observing gas leaks and other ecological threats.
Standard multispectral imaging (left) vs. hyperspectral imaging (right). Image Credits: EPFL
“We started with analyzing existing satellite images, and what we could do with this immediately,” explained Pixxel co-founder and CEO Awais Ahmed in an interview. “We realized that in most cases, it was not able to even see certain problems or issues that we wanted to solve — for example, we wanted to be able to look at air pollution and water pollution levels. But to be able to do that there were no commercial satellites that would enable us to do that, or even open source satellite data at the resolution that would enable us to do that.”
The potential of hyperspectral imaging on Earth, across a range of sectors, is huge, according to Ahmed, but Pixxel’s long-term vision is all about empowering a future commercial space sector to make the most of in-space resources.
“We started looking at space as a sector for us to be able to work in, and we realized that what we wanted to do was to be able to enable people to take resources from space to use in space,” Ahmed said. That included asteroid mining, for example, and when we investigated that, we found hyperspectral imaging was the imaging tech that would enable us to map these asteroids as to whether they contain these metals or these minerals. So that knowledge sort of transferred to this more short-term problem that we were looking at solving.”
Part of the reason that Pixxel’s founders couldn’t find existing available hyperspectral imaging at the resolutions they needed was that as a technology, it has previously been restricted to internal governmental use through regulation. The U.S. recently opened up the ability for commercial entities to pursue very high-resolution hyperspectral imaging for use on the private market, effectively because they realized that these technical capabilities were becoming available in other international markets anyway. Ahmed told me that the main blocker was still technical, however.
Image Credits: Pixxel
“If we were to build a camera like this even two or three years ago, it would not have been possible because of the miniaturized sensors, the optics, etc.,” he said. “The advances that have happened only happened very recently, so it’s also the fact that this the right time to take it from the scientific domain to the commercial domain.”
Pixxel now aims to have its first hyperspectral imaging satellite launched and operating on orbit within the next few months, and it will then continue to launch additional satellites after that once it’s able to test and evaluate the performance of its first spacecraft in an actual operating environment.
Early Stage is the premier “how-to” event for startup entrepreneurs and investors. You’ll hear firsthand how some of the most successful founders and VCs build their businesses, raise money and manage their portfolios. We’ll cover every aspect of company building: Fundraising, recruiting, sales, product-market fit, PR, marketing and brand building. Each session also has audience participation built-in — there’s ample time included for audience questions and discussion. Use code “TCARTICLE at checkout to get 20% off tickets right here.
Powered by WPeMatico
Space startup Gitai raises $17.1M to help build the robotic workforce of commercial space
Japanese space startup Gitai has raised a $17.1 million funding round, a Series B financing for the robotics startup. This new funding will be used for hiring, as well as funding the development and execution of an on-orbit demonstration mission for the company’s robotic technology, which will show its efficacy in performing in-space satellite servicing work. That mission is currently set to take place in 2023.
Gitai will also be staffing up in the U.S., specifically, as it seeks to expand its stateside presence in a bid to attract more business from that market.
“We are proceeding well in the Japanese market, and we’ve already contracted missions from Japanese companies, but we haven’t expanded to the U.S. market yet,” explained Gitai founder and CEO Sho Nakanose in an interview. So we would like to get missions from U.S. commercial space companies, as a subcontractor first. We’re especially interested in on-orbit servicing, and we would like to provide general-purpose robotic solutions for an orbital service provider in the U.S.”
Nakanose told me that Gitai has plenty of experience under its belt developing robots which are specifically able to install hardware on satellites on-orbit, which could potentially be useful for upgrading existing satellites and constellations with new capabilities, for changing out batteries to keep satellites operational beyond their service life, or for repairing satellites if they should malfunction.
Gitai’s focus isn’t exclusively on extra-vehicular activity in the vacuum of space, however. It’s also performing a demonstration mission of its technical capabilities in partnership with Nanoracks using the Bishop Airlock, which is the first permanent commercial addition to the International Space Station. Gitai’s robot, codenamed S1, is an arm–style robot not unlike industrial robots here on Earth, and it’ll be showing off a number of its capabilities, including operating a control panel and changing out cables.
Long-term, Gitai’s goal is to create a robotic workforce that can assist with establishing bases and colonies on the Moon and Mars, as well as in orbit. With NASA’s plans to build a more permanent research presence on orbit at the Moon, as well as on the surface, with the eventual goal of reaching Mars, and private companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin looking ahead to more permanent colonies on Mars, as well as large in-space habitats hosting humans as well as commercial activity, Nakanose suggests that there’s going to be ample need for low-cost, efficient robotic labor – particularly in environments that are inhospitable to human life.
Nakanose told me that he actually got started with Gitai after the loss of his mother – an unfortunate passing he said he firmly believes could have been avoided with the aid of robotic intervention. He began developing robots that could expand and augment human capability, and then researched what was likely the most useful and needed application of this technology from a commercial perspective. That research led Nakanose to conclude that space was the best long-term opportunity for a new robotics startup, and Gitai was born.
This funding was led by SPARX Innovation for the Future Co. Ltd, and includes funding form DcI Venture Growth Fund, the Dai-ichi Life Insurance Company, and EP-GB (Epson’s venture investment arm).
Powered by WPeMatico
Axiom Space raises $130 million for its commercial space station ambitions
One of the new space startups with the loftiest near-term goals has raised $130 million in a Series B round that demonstrates investor confidence in the scope of its ambitions: Axiom Space, which has been tapped by NASA to add privately developed space station modules to the ISS, announced the new funding led by C5 Capital.
This is the latest in a string of high-profile announcements for Axiom, which was founded in 2016 by a team including space professionals with a history of demonstrated expertise working on the International Space Station. Eventually, Axiom hopes to go from adding the first private commercial modules to the existing station, to creating their own, wholly private on-orbital platforms — for research, space tourism and more.
Axiom announced the people who will take part in its first-ever private astronaut launch to the ISS, which is set to fly next January using a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket. Axiom is the service provider for the mission, brokering the deal for the private spacefarers and setting up training and mission profile. That should be the first time we see a crew made up entirely of private individuals (i.e. not astronauts selected, trained and employed by their respective national government) make its way to the station.
The company was also in discussions with Tom Cruise about filming at least part of an upcoming film aboard the ISS, and it’s in development with a production company on a forthcoming competition reality show that will see contestants vie for a spot on a private flight to the station.
Axiom is emerging as the leading linkage between private human spaceflight and the existing infrastructure and industry, covering both public sector partners like NASA, and the “rails” of the bourgeoning industry — SpaceX and its ilk. It’s been focused on this unique opportunity longer than most in the private market, and it has all the relationships and in-house expertise to make it work.
This new, significant injection of capital will help the company hire, as well as boost its ability to construct the pieces of its forthcoming private space station modules, as well as its eventual station itself. The Houston-based company aims to put its ISS modules on the station by 2024, and it has raised $150 million to date.
Powered by WPeMatico
Omnispace raises $60M to fuse satellites and 5G into one ubiquitous network
5G has been on a tear the last few years as wireless operators and smartphone manufacturers have made a marketing push touting higher bandwidth and lower latency for users. Yet, for all the attention that 5G gets from consumers, some of the most important new applications for the next-generation wireless technology are actually on the enterprise side. The canonical example is self-driving cars, which will presumably rely on a combination of edge computing, low latency and high bandwidth in order to work.
Yet, there are far more applications that are perhaps even more interesting and more readily deployable today than AVs. On farms, connectivity can help with managing equipment, monitoring livestock and analyzing water usage to optimize plant growth. Logistics companies need to monitor global supply chains, tracking shipping containers as they wend their way around the world from port to port.
There’s just one problem: 5G wireless is hard to implement in rural areas where base stations are unprofitable to deploy and therefore few and far between. On the oceans of course, there are no wireless base stations at all.
DC-based Omnispace wants to offer ubiquitous 5G-compliant connectivity for enterprise users using a hybrid of wireless ground technology and satellites. The idea is that by integrating these two different modes — terrestrial and space — into one cohesive package, end users like agriculture and logistics companies wouldn’t have to transition their IoT connectivity between different types of technologies in order to secure the promise of 5G.
Today, the company announced a $60 million equity investment led by Joshua Pack of Fortress Investment Group, who serves as the burgeoning firm’s head of credit investing and also co-leads one of the firm’s SPACs, Fortress Value Acquisition. Existing investors Columbia Capital, Greenspring Associates, TDF Ventures and Telcom Ventures also participated in the round.
Omnispace started in 2012 as a holding company for wireless spectrum assets, particularly around the 2Ghz “S band” spectrum, which were purchased from the remnants of ICO Global, a satellite-based provider that had previously gone into bankruptcy. CEO Ram Viswanathan, who joined Omnispace in early 2016, said that the company started looking at how to use a technology layer to integrate its various assets together, eventually identifying an opportunity around global 5G connectivity with specific applications in IoT.
“The 5G rollout is going to be gated by the scope and rollout of mobile operators,” Viswanathan said. “Neither all of the landmass or customers are going to be covered” using traditional ground-based wireless technology. “Satellite’s main utility is really extending the reach of the network into more remote and rural areas.”
Viswanathan has spent decades in the satellite and wireless market, most recently as the co-founder of Devas Multimedia, an India-focused connectivity startup that has been embroiled in a long-running legal spat with the government there over the cancelation of the firm’s satellite launch, with U.S. courts recently ordering a government-affiliated commercialization business to pay Devas $1.2 billion in compensation.
While there is perhaps an easy comparable with SpaceX’s Starlink project, Omnispace is not focused on the consumer broadband market, but rather enterprise and IoT use cases. Furthermore, Omnispace is a hybrid network using a mix of different technologies, whereas Starlink is focused only on space deployment.
Omnispace is using its new capital from Fortress to flesh out its services and finish up pilot trials with some mobile operators and prepare the network for commercial usage starting in 2023, with the network ready in 2022. Viswanathan said that “our aim is to provide the service globally” with “a footprint that covers everywhere.”
Omnispace has contracted with Thales Alenia, part of the French space and defense conglomerate Thales Group, to execute on its space strategy. On the terrestrial side, it is tying together its spectrum assets and piloting with several mobile operators to bring out a cohesive solution, with early strength in Asia-Pacific and Latin America.
Powered by WPeMatico
bluShift Aerospace launches its first rocket powered by biofuels
New space startup bluShift wants to bring a new kind of propellant to the small satellite launching market, with rockets powered by bio-derived rocket fuels. These differ from traditional fuels in that they offer safety advantages during handling, and ecological advantages during production and use. The startup has been working on its solid rocket biofuel since its founding in 2014, and has received grants from the Maine Technology Institute and NASA’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program to refine its fuel formula and rocket engine design to help it get to this point.
The company achieved a milestone on Sunday with its first rocket launch — a low-altitude flight of a small sounding rocket, called Stardust 1.0. It’s a single-stage prototype, which can only carry 18 lbs of payload and is designed to achieve suborbital space. That may not seem like much, but it is enough to put small research equipment up into suborbital space, at costs that put launches within range for small companies and academic institutions.
Image Credits: Knack Factory/Courtesy Aerospace
Stardust 1.0 is designed to be reusable, though it’s still a prototype, and the company is also working on Stardust 2.0, which is a second prototype that’s expected to increase the payload capacity and act as the primary building block for its subsequent production commercial rockets, including Starless Rogue, a two-stage launcher for suborbital missions, and Red Dwarf, a three-stage, 66-lb capacity launch vehicle that can reach low Earth orbit.
Sunday’s launch looked like it might not have been on track to go well at first, with an initial attempt seeing the rocket’s ignition light — but without a takeoff. After resetting for a second try, there wasn’t any ignition. Finally the rocket did take off late in the day, with a flight that the company said “went perfectly” on a follow-up call with media.
Powered by WPeMatico
Virgin Orbit will launch first Dutch defense satellite in mission that will demo rapid response capabilities
Virgin Orbit isn’t slowing down after joining the exclusive club of small launch companies that have made it to orbit — the company just announced that it’s flying a payload on behalf of the Royal Netherlands Air Force (RNAF). This is the first-ever satellite being put up by the Dutch Ministry of Defense, and it’s a small satellite that will act as a test platform for a number of different communications experiments.
The satellite is called BRIK-II — not because it’s the second of its kind, but rather because it’s named after Brik, the first airplane ever owned and operated by the RNAF. This mission is one of Virgin Orbit’s first commercial operations after its successful test demonstration and will fly sometime later this year. It’s also being planned as a rideshare mission, with other payloads expected to join — likely from the U.S. Department of Defense, which is working with Virgin Orbit’s dedicated U.S. defense industry subsidiary VOX Space on planning what they’ll be adding to the mission load out.
This upcoming mission is actually a key demonstration of a number of Virgin Orbit’s unique advantages in the launch market. For one, it’ll show how the U.S. DOD and its ally defense agencies can work together in the space domain when launching small communications satellites. Virgin Orbit is also going to use the mission as an opportunity to show off its “late-load integration” capabilities — effectively, how it can add a payload to its LauncherOne rocket just prior to launch.
For this particular flight, there’s no real reason to do a late-load integration, since there’s plenty of lead time, but part of Virgin’s appeal is being able to nimbly add satellites to its rocket just before the carrier jet that flies it to its take-off altitude leaves the runway. Demonstrating that will go a long way to help illustrate how it differentiates its services from others in the launch market, such as Rocket Lab and SpaceX.
Powered by WPeMatico
SpaceX sets new record for most satellites on a single launch with latest Falcon 9 mission
SpaceX has set a new all-time record for the most satellites launched and deployed on a single mission, with its Transporter-1 flight on Sunday. The launch was the first of SpaceX’s dedicated rideshare missions, in which it splits up the payload capacity of its rocket among multiple customers, resulting in a reduced cost for each but still providing SpaceX with a full launch and all the revenue it requires to justify lauding one of its vehicles.
The launch today included 143 satellites, 133 of which were from other companies who booked rides. SpaceX also launched 10 of its own Starlink satellites, adding to the already more than 1,000 already sent to orbit to power SpaceX’s own broadband communication network. During a launch broadcast last week, SpaceX revealed that it has begun serving beta customers in Canada and is expanding to the UK with its private pre-launch test of that service.
Customers on today’s launch included Planet Labs, which sent up 48 SuperDove Earth imaging satellites; Swarm, which sent up 36 of its own tiny IoT communications satellites, and Kepler, which added to its constellation with eight more of its own communication spacecraft. The rideshare model that SpaceX now has in place should help smaller new space companies and startups like these build out their operational on-orbit constellations faster, complementing other small payload launchers like Rocket Lab, and new entrant Virgin Orbit, to name a few.
This SpaceX launch was also the first to deliver Starlink satellites to a polar orbit, which is a key part of the company’s continued expansion of its broadband service. The mission also included a successful landing and recovery of the Falcon 9 rocket’s first-stage booster, the fifth for this particular booster, and a dual recovery of the fairing halves used to protect the cargo during launch, which were fished out of the Atlantic ocean using its recovery vessels and will be refurbished and reused.
Powered by WPeMatico
Virgin Orbit targets launch window opening January 10 for next orbital flight attempt
Virgin Orbit is wasting no time in 2021 getting back to active flight testing: The company has a window for its next orbital demonstration launch attempt that opens on Sunday, January 10, and that continues throughout the rest of the month. This follows an attempt last year made in May, which ended before the LauncherOne rocket reached orbit — shortly after it detached from the Cosmic Girl carrier aircraft, in fact.
While that mission didn’t go exactly as Virgin Orbit had hoped, it was a significant milestone for the small satellite launch company, and helped gather a significant amount of data about how the vehicle performs in flight. LauncherOne was able to briefly light its rocket booster before safety systems on board automatically shut it down. The company had been looking to fly this second test before the end of last year, but issues including COVID-19 meant that they only got as far as the wet dress rehearsal (essentially a run-through of everything leading up to the flight with the vehicles fully fueled).
This next mission will once again attempt an orbital launch, and this time, the stakes are somewhat higher because actual customer payloads from NASA are on board. They include a number of small satellite science experiments and demonstrations, and while they’re specifically selected for the mission profile (meaning it’s not a tremendous loss if the launch fails), it still would make everyone happiest to actually get them to their target destination.
The nature of the launch window means that Virgin Orbit will likely wait for conditions to be as good as possible before taking off from the Mojave Air and Space Port in California, so take that January 10 date as the earliest possible launch time, but not necessarily the most likely. If successful, Virgin Orbit will join a select group of private small launch vehicles that have made it to orbit, so the industry will definitely be watching the next time Cosmic Girl takes off with LauncherOne attached.
Powered by WPeMatico
Astroscale ships its space junk removal demonstration satellite for March 2021 mission
Japanese startup Astroscale has shipped its ELSA-d spacecraft to the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazahkstan, where it will be integrated with a Soyuz rocket for a launch scheduled for March of next year. This is a crucial mission for Astroscale, since it’ll be the first in-space demonstration of the company’s technology for de-orbiting space debris, a cornerstone of its proposed space sustainability service business.
The ELSA-d mission by Astroscale is a small satellite mission that will demonstrate two key technologies that enable the company’s vision for orbital debris removal. First will be a targeting component, demonstrating an ability to locate and dock with a piece of space debris, using positioning sensors including GPS and laser locating technologies. That will be used by a so-called “servicer” satellite to find and attach to a “target” satellite launched at the same time, which will stand in for a potential piece of debris.
Astroscale intends to dock and release with the “target” using its “servicer” multiple times over the course of the mission, showing that it can identify and capture uncontrolled objects in space, and that it can maneuver them for controlled de-orbit. This will basically prove out the feasibility of the technology underlying its business model, and set it up for future commercial operations.
In October, Astroscale announced that it had raised $51 million, making its total raised to date $191 million. The company also acquired the staff and IP of a company called Effective Space Solutions in June, which it will use to build out the geostationary servicing arm of its business, in addition to the LEO operations that ELSA-d will demonstrate.
Powered by WPeMatico
Despite economic downturn, space startup funding defies gravity
The COVID-19 pandemic might have upended the global economy, but according to Meagan Crawford at Spacefund and Chris Moran with Lockheed Martin Ventures, it didn’t dampen investment in space startups.
The space industry has enjoyed a honeymoon period with hundreds of startups popping up in the past five to seven years following SpaceX’s success.
Spacefund research conducted earlier this year found that there is almost no correlation between the global economy and the space industry, said Crawford, a managing partner at the VC firm, last Thursday at TC Sessions: Space 2020. Crawford and Moran both agreed that interest and investment in space will increase as more startups have successful exits.
“We looked back historically over the last decade and a little bit more, and it turns out that even during the 2008-2009 economic downturn, the space industry continued to grow at 7% per year,” Crawford said, adding that they saw almost no correlation between the performance of the Global S&P 1200 and the space industry.
“I think a lot of this has to do with a big portion of the industry coming from government budgets, which provides a lot of stability even in economically rough times, as well as the industry being in such high demand and going through such a high-growth phase right now that even the pandemic couldn’t really slow it down,” she said.
Early-stage investments did suffer at the beginning of the year, Moran noted after the event, but added that it appeared to be temporary.
“Firms were circling the wagons on their portfolios, in-person incubator programs went on hiatus, so there were fewer early-stage companies out there and less money for those companies,” he said, adding that Pitchbook data confirmed LMVC’s suspicions and showed a 25% to 27% drop in new company formation over that time.
Since September, LMVC has seen a spike in new companies. Meanwhile, incubators and accelerators have adapted to COVID-19 restrictions, Zoom made face-to-face meetings easy and life “as usual” started back up again, Moran added.
Exits are driving investments
The space industry has enjoyed a honeymoon period with hundreds of startups popping up in the past five to seven years following SpaceX’s success. Moran said this unabashed growth period will continue for a few years before narrowing.
“So like any any industry in VC, you see a lot of people jump in and then as business models collide and the need to generate some sustainable business happens there’s a lot of winnowing and narrowing of the field,” Moran said. “We’re probably still in that growth period, but I imagine over the next few years, we’ll start seeing this winnowing and really focus on the folks who have a technology and a business model that will be successful long term.”
Right now, the entire industry is funded on private capital, said Moran, who predicted investing is going to grow for some time as long as people see the excitement and promise of the industry. He added that easy access to public markets — notably the rise in mergers with special purpose acquisition companies — could drive even more money into space.
Powered by WPeMatico