Spaceflight to launch 11 small satellites on India’s PSLV in December/January

The PSLV. Image courtesy of ISRO.

Seattle-based satellite rideshare and mission management provider Spaceflight has announced that it will launch 11 small satellites on India’s next launch.

The launch will see the PSLV C40 carry the Cartosat-2ER Earth observation satellite from India’s  Cartosat-2 series as its main payload and will be India’s next launch. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has said that the launch is scheduled for late December 2017, although the recent Spaceflight announcement puts it in January.

The 11 satellites managed by Spaceflight are mostly CubeSats, with Finland’s first commercial satellite, the ICEYE-X1 SAR microsatellite, being the heaviest. The batch also includes Planetary Resources’ Arkyd-6 6U asteroid prospecting demonstration cubesat, four Spire Global Lemur-2 cubesats, Astro Digital’s Landmapper-BC3, AMSAT’s Fox-1D cubesat, and others. These will join other CubeSats, including 6 from South Korean universities.

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“PSLV-C40 is a perfect example of how our flexible, full-service rideshare model is enabling new commercial space businesses to exist while expanding into new markets,” said Curt Blake, president of Spaceflight. “This mission brings new customers from outside the industry into space while continuing partnerships with existing customers for their ongoing satellite constellations.”

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