Surrey Satellite Technology (SSTL) and Viasat marked the start of operations of the new Viasat antenna system installed at SSTL's Guildford headquarters in the UK. The new antenna system forms part of the Viasat Real-Time Earth (RTE) network, a hybrid ground and space network designed to provide satellite data to users on-demand without the need to invest in a dedicated antenna system. SSTL can now offer satellites with a full range of ground services to its customers, enabling delivery of data to customers' processing centres on a subscription basis.
The antenna system installed at SSTL is a full-motion, 5.4m system that can operate in both S and X bands and is fully-controlled from the Viasat Network Operation Centre in Colorado. The Guildford site joins other sites in the US, Argentina, Australia and Sweden as part of Viasat's roll-out of the RTE network.
The new antenna system was installed in November 2017, and it has been used to command and control SSTL satellites, thus fully testing out the network architecture. Routing from the SSTL Satellite Operations Centre (SOC) in Guildford through the RTE network to the satellites has been achieved and final testing is now underway with expected completion by end-January.
SSTL's payload data share customers, such as those signed up for the NovaSAR mission, will benefit from access to payload data via the option of a bundled payload and network access contract.
In addition to the RTE network, SSTL's ground infrastructure includes two ground stations in the UK and a ground station mini rack at Kongsberg Satellite Services facilities in Svalbard.