On Orbit

In this week’s On Orbit podcast episode, we hear firsthand about the impact the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship is making. Patti Grace Smith was a pioneer in the aerospace industry who served as the head of the Federal Aviation Administration’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation. She broke many barriers as a Black woman and was an inspiration to many. The Patti Grace Smith fellowship honors her legacy by working to combat racial inequity in the aerospace industry. 

In this episode we hear from two fellows about how they have been impacted by the fellowship. AJ Bekoe was a Patti fellow in 2022 with Ball Aerospace and is now a member of the fellowship’s executive team. A graduate of Syracuse University, AJ was hired by her host company and she is now a Systems Engineer at BAE Systems. 

Spencer Roberts is a member of the class of 2024, interning at ABL Space Systems. He is studying Mechanical Engineering at Santa Clara University

AJ and Spencer share their experiences with the intern program and talk about the value of the community it builds, from the cohort of fellows who spend a week together in Washington, D.C., to the network of former fellows and mentors. They also share their perspectives on how companies can step up efforts to recruit a diverse workforce, and tips for students applying for the fellowship. Applications for the class of 2025 are due by Tuesday, October 1. 

This episode in the Future Space Economy series highlights breakthroughs from leading space system manufacturers in building autonomous robots that inspect, service, assemble, build, and refuel in orbit. The discussion digs into advances in additive manufacturing, shares lessons learned from major in-space demonstrations, and outlines demand for commercially built robotics.

This episode’s guests include: Al Tadros, CTO of Redwire; Holly Johnson, vice president of Robotics and Space Operations, MDA Space; Kevin Smith, chief engineer, Orbit Fab; Joe Anderson, vice president of Space Logistics, a Northrop Grumman company. 

On-board propulsion is one of the biggest decisions that satellite operators make in the process of designing their spacecraft. The decision impacts the cost, weight, and capability of a satellite. And it can be a challenging decision to make because of the technology and fragmented nature of the propulsion market. 

In this episode of On Orbit, we talk to Dr. Daniel Perez Grande, CEO and co-founder of in-space mobility company Ienai Space. Daniel breaks down some of the ways the propulsion market is evolving. As the small satellite industry matures and the orbital environment in LEO gets more congested, its driving a greater need for mobility and onboard propulsion. He explains how prospective customers and investors look at the market, and some of the challenges startup propulsion companies are facing. 

Ienai Space is developing the Athena thruster, and Daniel addresses the company’s approach and the importance of looking at mobility holistically versus just a propulsion system. Also, Ienai Space is based in Madrid, and he also shares some insight into Spain’s startup space industry.

You probably use Bluetooth every day to connect your phone to your car, speakers, and headphones. Now satellite startup Hubble Network is rethinking the bounds of Bluetooth to unlock low-cost IoT connections from space. 

This week, Alex Haro, co-founder of Hubble Network, joins On Orbit. Hubble recently demonstrated a bluetooth connection from space. The company is working to build a satellite network that allows off the shelf bluetooth chips to be connected anywhere in the world via satellite. 

Alex is also one of the co-founders of Life 360, a location-sharing app Life360 used by many families, and the app intends to use Hubble’s satellite technology for a global location-tracking network. In this episode, Alex shares the tech innovations that enabled Hubble to reach this milestone, the intersection of consumer and space technology, and what’s possible for individuals and industries with expanded low-cost IoT connectivity.

OneWeb is one of the most compelling stories of the New Space era. From its start as one of the first constellation ventures, and early success, to its fall in bankruptcy and rebirth under new ownership, the company has captured the space industry's attention for years. 

Caleb Henry is working to catalog that story, writing a book about OneWeb. Henry is a very familiar face to Via Satellite readers — he is a former reporter for both Via Satellite and Space News, and he is now Director of Research for Quilty Space.  

Henry joins On Orbit this week to talk about his OneWeb book project. He spent the last year conducting interviews and recently secured an agent. He shares an inside look at his process — from conducting more than 250 interviews to how he’s adapting his journalistic writing style to the long-form nature of writing a book. And, Henry shares why thinks it's so important to tell the story of OneWeb. 

With the approaching retirement of the International Space Station (ISS), NASA has contracted several commercial companies to develop orbital facilities that will fulfill the need for a wide range of research and business activities in space.

In this episode, which is part of the Future Space Economy Series, we focus on NASA’s three contracted space station development partners – Axiom Space’s Axiom Hab One, Blue Origin’s Orbital Reef, and Voyager Space’s Starlab. Speakers from Voyager Space, Arkisys, and MDA Space compare and contrast deployment schedules, program costs, and capabilities of future commercial space stations in a discussion that maps out commercial space industry opportunities in a post-ISS world.

Wildfires have a devastating impact on human and animal life, property, biodiversity, and air quality, local economies, and so much more. In this week’s On Orbit podcast, we hear about a new coalition bringing together NGOs, philanthropy, and a satellite company to change wildfire response.

Satellite company Muon Space is working with the Earth Fire Alliance, a new non-profit to build and deploy FireSat — a satellite constellation purpose-built for global wildfire response. The full satellite constellation announced in May is planned for more than 50 satellites. It was designed with input from more than 200 members of the research and fire communities. 

Our guests for this episode are Cathy Olkin, former NASA scientist and principal scientist for Muon Space, and Brian Collins, executive director of Earth Fire Alliance. They share how this coalition came together and why they turned to space technology to bring new and accessible data to first responders, climate scientists, and governments. 

In this episode, we’re joined by Ashley Johnson, Planet CFO and president for a conversation about how satellite data contributes to transparency for peace and security, and how Planet works with partners to accelerate the impact of its data. 

Ashley shares the successes of some specific partnerships that deal with reducing tropical forest loss and mapping the impact of climate change on vulnerable populations. When there are so many impactful use cases for satellite data, Ashley gives some insight into how Planet decides which ones to focus its resources on. 

We talk about the business impact as well. As CFO and president, Ashley tells her team that they have to “do well in order to do good,” emphasizing that Planet needs to be financially sound in order to have the greatest impact for good. 

This episode is sponsored by AvL Technologies, an industry leading manufacturer of multi-band and multi-orbit satellite communications ground terminals for military, government and commercial applications. 

Connectivity is the cornerstone of today’s global economy and it will certainly be the case for the Future Space Economy, with even more complex, data-centric applications. We spent decades building the global satellite connectivity infrastructure around Earth, is it possible to replicate Earth’s satellite connectivity infrastructure on the Moon, or on other planets?

This episode of the On Orbit Future Space Economy series explores what deep space satellite networks will look like, and how they will be built to perform in extraordinary environments. We’ll also discuss the history of deep-space exploration and research satellites and what we’ve learned from those missions.

This episode features Matthew Harris, space focus area lead for QinetiQ; James Spicer, technical director of Kepler Communications US; and Sita Sonty, CEO of Space Tango. This episode was recorded live at SATELLITE 2024. 

In this week’s On Orbit episode, we’re joined by Patrick Shannon, CEO of TrustPoint. Patrick won the 2024 Startup Space pitch contest at SATELLITE in March, competing against nine other startups.  

TrustPoint is building a commercial GPS system, and working toward its own constellation of around 300 spacecraft in Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) to offer GPS services that have more affordable precision, better security, and greater availability. Patrick breaks down some of the the limitations of traditional GPS and why we are now seeing more commercial businesses like TrustPoint looking to provide new solutions to GPS issues. 

He takes us inside the Startup Space experience, talks about the impact it has made on the company so far, and previews what’s next for TrustPoint. The company is shifting out of an internal R&D phase and into more demonstrations and testing with customers and partners. 

This episode is sponsored by AvL Technologies, an industry leading manufacturer of multi-band and multi-orbit satellite communications ground terminals for military, government and commercial applications. Learn more at https://www.avltech.com/