November 2008 Satellite NewsVisit www.satnews.com for today's news
November 29, 2008 Chatting It Up With MiniSats Is Harris Harris Corporation (NYSE:HRS) has been awarded an eight-month study contract by the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, Sensors Directorate, Wright Patterson AFB, to develop a new modular communications architecture for satellites that weigh less than 400 kilograms.
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November 27, 2008 Falco + Bravo+ UAVs To Join Pakistan's Air Force From Jane's online site comes a report that the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) will formally induct unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) into service for the first time in 2009.
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November 26, 2008 Time For Family, Friends... + Turkey! For those of our readers who celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday, may we wish you and yours a truly delightful day.
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Keeping A Watch On WATCHKEEPER UAV Thales UK has successfully completed the first system flight trials of the WATCHKEEPER unmanned air vehicle (UAV).
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Mexican Dish — Food Not Included Coming soon to Mexico as the result of a joint venture between MVS Comunicaciones and EchoStar Corporation [Nasdaq: SATS] is Dish Mexico which will launch “Dish,” an affordable satellite TV service that will be available to consumers across Mexico.
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Radome Helps Route Indian Research Reports MFG Galileo Composites announced the completion of an 18-foot composite radome installation for the government of India’s National Center for Antarctic & Ocean Research (NCAOR).
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Repurposement Key To USCG UAV Plans After scrapping plans for its own vertical liftoff unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) last year, the United States Coast Guard is now making plans to use or adapt Navy, Customs, and Border Patrol UAVs for its own needs.
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World Teleport Association Seeks the Operator of the Year The deadline is narrowing to submit your entry to become the teleport operator of the year. Submissions must be in by January 23, 2009, and the winners will be announced on March 25, 2009, during an invitational Awards Luncheon at SATELLITE 2009, World Teleport Association, making this year the 13th annual Teleport Awards for Excellence.? Awards are presented in four categories:
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COTM Nets Now Have SNT Emulator Available Scalable Network Technologies, Inc. (SNT) has introduced EXata™, an advanced wireless network emulator for test and evaluation of military and commercial on-the-move wireless communication networks.
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Juno Jammin' For Jupiter NASA is officially moving forward on a mission to conduct an unprecedented, in-depth study of Jupiter. Called Juno, the mission will be the first in which a spacecraft is placed in a highly elliptical polar orbit around the giant planet to understand its formation, evolution, and structure.
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Hungary DTH Service Acquires AMOS-3 Attention Spacecom (Tel Aviv Stock Exchange: SCC), the operator of the AMOS satellite fleet, has announced that Hungary's newest DTH (Direct-to-Home) service, T-Home SatTV, has commenced operations using AMOS-3, Spacecom's newest satellite launched in April 2008.
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Ball Aerospace On the Ball, Passes Instrument Critical Design Review The Operational Land Imager (OLI) being built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. for the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM), the eighth in the Landsat satellite series, has successfully passed the Instrument Critical Design Review (ICDR).
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Uplink Freqs Samples Tester From AtlanTechRF AtlanTecRF has launched an all new series of loop test translators that operate in the Ka-band of satellite communications in support of the nexgen of ground based transmit and receive stations.
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Whomping On SatCom Data Sends Is UDcast UDcast's new WANcompress bandwidth optimization feature for the UDgateway is now available. WANcompress will attack the high operating expenditure (OPEX) associated with satellite communications by reducing the amount of data sent over the satellite connection.
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Shuttle and Station Astronauts Send Special Greetings to Military It's important to remember those that can't be at the table with us this Thanksgiving, especially those defending our rights to enjoy this holiday. Furthering this gesture, the combined crews of shuttle Endeavour and the International Space Station have sent a special greeting to members of the American military in time for the upcoming holiday season.
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Bringing Streamlined Processes To Full Effect At EADS IBM (NYSE:IBM) and Dassault Systemes (DS) (Paris:DSY) (NASDAQ:DASTY) have announced EADS’ commitment to IBM and Dassault Systemes’ product lifecycle management (PLM), for 3D collaborative design and manufacturing applications and services.
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November 25, 2008 Polar Mission Control Systems Contract Signed By ISE... Integral Systems Europe (ISE),[Nasdaq: ISYS], has signed a yearly renewable contract to support the Polar Mission Control System (MCS) over the next 15 years with the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT).
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ODN Offsets Emergencies For Government Agencies With Super SatServices Spacenet Inc. has announced that its Channel Partner Orbital Data Net (ODN) recently deployed Spacenet's high-performance Connexstar satellite services in support of emergency networks for government agencies to help bring vital communications online during severe weather conditions.
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Fuelishly A Winner With A UAV Flight Record From a story written by Andrew Williams in gas2.0's online site, a group of University of Michigan students have set a new world record for the longest flight by a fuel-cell powered plane... actually, a UAV.
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Rural Northern Ireland To Receive Avanti Advantages Satellite operator Avanti Communications Group Plc (AIM: AVN) has been notified by the Department of Enterprise Trade and Investment that it intends to award the contract for supply of remote broadband services in Northern Ireland to Avanti.
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Maritime SatCom Solution Enhancements Completed By Globe Wireless Globe Wireless has made available a new version of the Rydex software, now branded GlobeRydex.
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Video Delivery That's Over The Top, As Seen By ABI Research As cable providers beef up their PC video offerings, satellite and telco operators increasingly see over-the-top broadband video delivery as a viable option to shore up their own weaknesses.
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2.4 Million Cyfrowy Polsat Subscribers Say, "Wspaniale, Dzieki!" to EchoStar Europe EchoStar Europe has made a major step forward in Poland with their advanced, high definition (HD) set-top box (STB) that has been introduced by Cyfrowy Polsat, the largest Polish satellite television platform serving 2.4 million subscribers in Poland, who no doubt say, "Great, thanks!"
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Biting The Bullet Are NigComSat-1 Insurers Insurers providing cover for NigComSat-1 satellite, which is now grounded in space, may pay as much as N17 billion in claims.
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Saturn Casts A Gigantic Shadow In this photo from the Cassini-Huygens mission, Saturn's shadow cuts across the rings in this view from high above the ringplane.
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The ISRO's Chandrayaan-1 Moons All The Indian Space Research Organisation’s lunar orbiter Chandrayaan-1 released a probe that impacted close to the lunar south pole on November 14.
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UDcast Saves Bandwidth and Security While Accelerating Performance UDcast announced WANcompress for the UDgateway, a solution for security and performance acceleration within the satellite community, now offers bandwidth optimization to reduce the high operating expenditure (OPEX) associated with satellite communications.
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Not One, But Eight, Years For EO-1 — Congratz! NASA's Earth Observer-1 (EO-1) has reached its eighth anniversary on orbit.
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NASA's Project Support Comes in the Form of Science Applications International Corporation NASA has selected Science Applications International Corporation of Houston to provide project management support services at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
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November 24, 2008 U.S.A.F. Tags MCL For A New TWTA MCL Inc., a MITEQ Company, is a global supplier of satellite communications (SATCOM) and instrumentation equipment.
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Arabsat's BADR-6 Gains Broadcasters Arab Satellite Communications Organization (Arabsat) has announced that it finalized the contracts of about 12 TV channels and some bequest for Arab television corporations within the last two months.
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Mongolia Means More For Gilat Gilat Satellite Networks Ltd. (Nasdaq: GILT) has announced Incomnet has added Gilat's SkyAbis cellular backhaul solution to its satellite communications network to serve Mongolia's mobile operators.
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Yachting Comm Improvements With Globe + Intelsat Globe Wireless and Intelsat have launched the GlobeSwift Mini-Ku VSAT service.
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An iDirect Evolution For Africa iDirect, Inc. will implement a pan-African DVB-S2/ACM satellite network built on iDirect’s Evolution platform.
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It's All Business With The Space Foundation In New York The Space Foundation will conduct the second annual Space Business Forum: New York on June 4, 2009, at the Hilton New York Hotel in New York City.
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Astra's DTH A Magnifique Réussite Now participating in 3/4 of a million homes in France is SES Astra's TNTSat, which offers satellite delivered programming from terrestrial transmitters into regions of France where such signals cannot be received.
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A Rocky Snap From ISS This astronaut photograph was acquired on October 28 with a Nikon D2Xs digital camera that was fitted with an 180-mm lens and was taken by the Expedition 18 crew. The photo highlights a portion of the Great Divide in the Rocky Mountains approximately 31 kilometers due west of Boulder, Colorado.
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More Than Comm For New South Korean Sat—Plankton, Fishery, Pollution + More South Korea plans to launch a maritime communication and weather satellite into space in June 2009, according to reports from South Korea's Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs.
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OS Is Secure With Plenty Of Integrity, Highly-So Integrity Global Security, a wholly owned subsidiary of Green Hills Software Inc., has announced the Company's Integrity-178B operating system has been certified by the National Information Assurance Partnership (NIAP), a U.S. government initiative operated by the National Security Agency (NSA), to Common Criteria Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL) 6 , High Robustness.
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No Need for Opera Glasses with SES AMERICOM and All Mobile Video Quite an accomplishment as audiences in more than 800 local venues across North America enjoy the best seats in the house for the Metropolitan Opera’s 125th season which furthers the Metropolitan's mission of opera for the masses.
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Ribbon Is Cut as NASA and USAID SERVIR-Africa Good news that should provide positive changes as NASA, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and their international partners cut the ribbon Friday in Nairobi, Kenya, for SERVIR-Africa which integrates the satellite resources of the United States and other countries into a Web-based Earth information system.
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U.S.A.F. Accelerates SBIRS Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center officials at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico have successfully tested the Space-Based Infrared System Highly Elliptical Orbit payload and operations center and accelerated operational acceptance by six weeks.
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November 23, 2008 SpaceX Is All Fired Up! On November 22, Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) successfully conducted a full mission-length firing of its Falcon 9 launch vehicle's first stage at its McGregor Test Facility in Texas, on November 22.
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November 21, 2008 Flames, Smoke, The Rumble Of Power... All Are Good Signs For ATK On November 20th, a successful 5.5-second ground test of a launch abort motor for the Orion crew exploration vehicle was conducted by NASA and the industry team, Alliant Techsystems, at Promontory, Utah, the latter's testing facility.
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Fab Reviews of CASBAA Convention 2008 Favorable reports are in regarding the CASBAA Convention 2008 which attracted more than 1,700 delegates, speakers and sponsors from around the world, looking to the future of Asia’s consistently growing pay-TV market, even as some negative aspects affected other global media trends.
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The Frigid Clutch Of Glaciers... On Mars? NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed vast Martian glaciers of water ice under protective blankets of rocky debris at much lower latitudes than any ice previously identified on the Red Planet.
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Intelsat Honors Awesome African Communication Companies Intelsat, Ltd. announced the recipients of its 2008 Intelsat Excellence Awards for the Africa Region representing leading African communication companies, were honored this week at a ceremony in Cape Town, South Africa.
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Magnetar Musings, Thanks To ESA's XMM-Newton + Integral Studies X-ray and gamma-ray data from ESA's XMM-Newton and Integral orbiting observatories has been used to test, for the first time, the physical processes that make magnetars, an atypical class of neutron stars, shine in X-rays.
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ND SatCom's Military Trailer Tactical Towable Terminal ND SatCom, an SES ASTRA company released a full-featured, trailer-mounted, military tactical terminal which is HMMWV-towable and supports communication via satellite or over troposcatter Beyond-Line-of-Site links.
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Image Is Everything For KARI + PCI Geomatics PCI Geomatics has completed their contract with the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) to build an automated production system for the orthorectification, mosaicking and pansharpening of KOMPSAT-2 satellite imagery.
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Meeting Media Conversion Needs Is Omnitron Systems Omnitron Systems Technology has introduced their new X.21 and RS-530 serial Crypto Circuits fiber optic extension devices.
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Switch Matrix Technology Finds Hypres A Middleman Twixt Analog + Digital Hypres is currently developing a family of reprogrammable all-digital receivers, transmitters, and transceivers.
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Sat | IP Net Linkage Provided By Logic Innovations Logic Innovations has now commenced shipments of its 4G DVB IP Encapsulator, the IPE-4000.
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Into Wild Blue Yonder with REDSAT From Thales Alenia Space España Thales Alenia Space announced today that HISPASAT has signed an agreement with Thales Alenia Space Espana, its Spanish subsidiary, for the development and supply of the REDSAT Advanced Communication Payload for the AG1, a Small GEO mission within the scope of the European Space Agency’s ARTES 11 program.
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Hovering Is Definitely An Option For CartoPac GPS Field Software CartoPac Field Solutions has teamed with GeoSpatial Experts to provide software that will make it easier for field workers to download, view and reference GPS points of photos from the enterprise database.
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MLB To Play Ball With Intelsat Intelsat, Ltd. now has MLB Network, the new 24-hour cable network devoted to Major League Baseball and other baseball programming, as a client.
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Touchdown For Crawford With Total Game Coverage For NFL Crawford Satellite Services division kicked off the 2008 football season with NFL Network. Selected by the Network, Crawford offers a line-up of HD SD origination, playout, and monitoring services in addition to on-site satellite uplink truck support for game coverage.
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A Maritime Moment For GMV In Malaysia GMV and Astronautic Technology (M) Sdn. Bhd. (ATSB) have won an international bid to establish Malaysia’s coastal Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS) network as an aid to Malaysia’s maritime navigation.
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The UAV Dilemma For Russia May Be Solved By Israel Russia is apparently in the market for Israeli UAVs. Even though Russia has been building UAVs for several decades, the country has not yet achieved the performance inherent in Israeli and American UAVs.
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Alenia Aeronautica Sky-High Over Sky-Y UAV The Sky-Y of Alenia Aeronautica is the first European unmanned aircraft of the MALE (Medium Altitude Long Endurance) class to have completed a series of ground surveillance missions, by using a European-made electro-optical sensor, to have transmitted data to the ground through a satellite system and to have accomplished missions in any weather condition.
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More Energy For Multi-Tasked UAVs From EnerDel Ener1, Inc. has announced the transition to phase two of the Company's research and development contract with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD).
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Moving On Up . . .NASA's Arthur E. (Gene) Goldman NASA has named Arthur E. (Gene) Goldman as the new director of NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center in Mississippi.
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Ending the Year with a Roar, Ariane's HOT BIRD 9 and W2M The dual-satellite payload for Ariane space's sixth mission of 2008 is beginning its integration process with launcher hardware as preparations move forward for the year-end flight of two communications satellites, HOT BIRD 9 and W2M, at the service of Europe's telecommunications operator, Eutelsat.
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Smells In Space Shuttle — ENose to the Rescue Something that not everyone thinks about when envisioning life on the ISS, that being smelling dangerous chemicals. NASA astronauts on space shuttle Endeavour's STS-126 mission will install an instrument that can "smell" dangerous chemicals in the air.
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U.S. Coast Guard Goes for the (Thales) Gold Standard Thales Communications, Inc., will provide its medium-powered, High-Frequency Automated Link Establishment (HF-ALE) radio communications system to the U.S. Coast Guard for incorporation into new cutter acquisition contracts for the next five to seven years.
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NigComSat-1 Has Truly Been Unavoidably Detained — Permanently! "Electricity power exhaustion" — hmmmm, a rather underpowered statement from the China Great Wall Industry Corporation as to the reason the comsat NigComSat-1 has failed to report for duty.
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Tiros Space information: Spacecraft Update This is an interim update to the author’s World Spacecraft Digest 1957-2007 and covers the period August – October 2008.
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All About Acquisitions... EMS Technologies + Satamatics Global EMS Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:ELMG) has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Satamatics Global Ltd., a global provider of Inmarsat IsatM2M (machine-to-machine or “M2M”) services, headquartered in Tewkesbury, U.K.
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November 20, 2008 Mini Honey(well) of a Deal For U.S. Air Force Technology is generally taking up a smaller footprint, everything from iPods to phones, and Honeywell [NYSE:HON] has contributed its share to provide the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory with a mini momentum control system for space missions.
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Thales Assists In Operation With Israel Aerospace to Deliver Amos Thales Alenia Space has contracted with Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) Ltd, for the development, the delivery and the installation of elements in the Amos-4 Ground Segment.
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Financially Speaking — It's Good for Israel Aerospace 2008 Third Quarter Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) announced a 2008 third quarter net profit of $16 million (after a $16 million provision for employee-related expenses, compared with $6 million employee-related expenses for the third quarter of 2007).
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Gateway Communications Evolves Into Africa With iDirect VT iDirect, Inc. (iDirect), announced that Gateway Communications will implement a pan-African DVB-S2/ACM satellite network built on iDirect's Evolution platform.
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CPI Creates Ka-Band Waves for USAF Communications & Power Industries, Inc. (CPI) has been awarded a $1.4 million contract to design, develop and test high-power Ka-band traveling wave tubes (TWTs) and amplifiers for the U.S. Air Force in order to support airborne communications applications.
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EMS' Products Stand At Attention and Party-on at MilCom 2008 EMS Technologies, Inc. [NASDAQ: ELMG] hosted an EMS Embedded Lounge at MILCOM 2008 honoring its 40 years in partnership with aerospace and defense contractors, technology providers and the U.S. military, and featured information about current EMS solutions for net-centric warfare and new advanced technologies and products for air-to-ground mobile communications.
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You See Spots — New Services From SPOT Image SPOT Image Corp. introduced two new service offerings developed to provide clients with direct access to SPOT satellite imagery in the Google Earth(TM) environment.
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Getting Their Hands On Five Intelsat Launches Is Sea Launch Sea Launch and Intelsat have signed a multiple launch services contract for five missions on the Sea Launch system, scheduled for execution beginning in late 2010 through 2012.
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North American SatNet For MSV Gains The Official O.K. To Proceed Mobile Satellite Ventures LP (MSV) has just announced the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has granted communications licenses for the two new MSV gateways in the U.S. that are being built to support the company’s nexgen integrated satellite-terrestrial communication network for North America.
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November 19, 2008 NASA's 20 Million Mile, Super Long Distance Internet Connection An amazing feat that took 10 years between NASA and Google resulted in a successful test of the first deep space communications network modeled on the Internet from a NASA spacecraft located about 20 million miles from Earth.
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NASA's QuickSCAT Sat and Co. Receive Awards Worthy of attention and so they were honored — an Earth-observing satellite that has provided early detection of ocean storms and advanced the scientific exploration of global ocean wind patterns has been recognized for helping scientists better understand our home planet.
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Sonema Craves Capacity, Intelsat In To Help Sonema, a provider of telecommunication services in Europe and Africa, expanded its current agreement with Intelsat for contracted satellite capacity, which will increase Sonema’s enterprise services offerings.
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Raytheon To Restore and Reach Over Atlantic For Navy Raytheon Company [NYSE: RTN] has been awarded a task order to restore the available bandwidth of the Global Broadcast Service satellite communications system over the Atlantic Ocean to support naval vessels and operations.
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Boeing Adds On and Upgrades Air Force GPS Sat Boeing [NYSE: BA] announced they will add improved capabilities to its technology for the U.S. Air Force's Operational Control Segment (OCS) satellite ground-control system.
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EMP Furnishes Gateway In and Out Of Africa Europe Media Port (EMP) announced that it is providing key services from its Greek teleport to Gateway Communications for its newly launched operations on AfricaSat-1 into Africa.
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Wavestream Part of a WIN-T -Win Situation Wavestream Corporation, a manufacturer of new-generation solid-state power amplifiers (SSPAs), today announced it has completed delivery of initial orders for 196 Ka-band SSPAs for the U.S. Army’s Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) Increment 1 and is well underway on fulfilling follow-on orders for more than 240 additional units.
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Northrop Grumman Senses Three Down, Two to Go Northrop Grumman Corporation [NYSE:NOC] announced that the third sensor of five has been delivered to NASA for integration onto the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) Preparatory Project (NPP) spacecraft.
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Ingenio Sat Electronic Goodies To Come From Thales' Sub Thales Alenia Space' Spanish subsidiary, Thales Alenia Space Espana, has been awarded a 17 million euro contract by Sener, the payload prime contractor, to supply the electronics for the optical observation Instrument on the Ingenio satellite.
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November 18, 2008 Hubble Shoots First Bright Light of New Planet Perhaps Complete With Rings The story doesn't begin here, but this is what was announced. Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have taken the first visible-light snapshots of a planet orbiting another star.
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Smokey the Bear Not Happy With NASA Satellites of So. California Wildfires Images from NASA satellites give a wider perspective of the full extent and devastation of the wildfires raging in Southern California. A pair of images from NASA's Aqua satellite show the Los Angeles metropolitan area on November 16, 2008.
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NASA's Robotic Arm Puts Leonardo In Its Place STS-126 and Expedition 18 crew members used a robotic arm Monday to attach the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module onto the International Space Station. The crews also prepared for Tuesday’s spacewalk by mission specialists Heide Stefanyshyn-Piper and Steve Bowen.
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Egypt Shakes Hands With Thuraya Handhelds A new agreement has been announced to further boost distribution of Thuraya’s sleek mobile satellite handhelds in the Egyptian market with i2, a telecom equipment retailer based in Saudi Arabia.
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NASA's Got The Spirit, But Must Save It After assessing data received from NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit on Thursday, mission controllers laid out plans for the rover to conserve its modest energy during the next few weeks.
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ISS Celebration Cake In Outerspace Can Get Messy The world has turned the 10th birthday of a unique research laboratory, the International Space Station into a great celebration.
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Dynamic Monitoring Control Brought To Nileseat By GMV The Egyptian satellite operator, Nilesat, has selected GMV's real-time satellite monitoring and control product, hifly, to control the new Nilesat -201 satellite.
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Generation 2 To Be Empowered By Saft TSaft has landed the battery manufacturer an 18-satellite contract with MicroSat Systems, Inc. (MSI). This contract marks the largest single order ever for microsatellite batteries.
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Make Way For Business + Lifestyle SES ASTRA has announced that em24, a digital business- and lifestyle channel, will start broadcasting on the ASTRA satellite system via Astra 1G.
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A Ton Of INTEGRITY From Green Hills Green Hills Software, Inc. has formed INTEGRITY Global Security, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Green Hills Software, Inc.
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November 17, 2008 Artfully Produced By BAE Systems, New UAV Launcher Enables Rapid Deployment A team from BAE Systems has developed a much-needed capability for front line warfighter use — a compact mortar-based launcher for small Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs).
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U.S.A.F. + U.S. Army Want Sky Warrior In Action—May Not Agree On Every Aspect From the Strategy Page comes the report that UAVs may soon be true, self-thinking, autonomous craft.
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Iridium's Small Handset = Vizada's Bundle Of Joy Vizada, a provider of global satellite communications solutions has integrated the Iridium 9555 handset into its mobile satellite services (MSS) portfolio.
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Thales Alenia Space España Hit An Optical Nerve Center Thales Alenia Space's Spanish subsidiary, Thales Alenia Space Espana, was awarded a 17 million euro contract by Sener, the payload prime contractor, to supply the electronics for the optical observation Instrument on the Ingenio satellite.
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The Positive Power of Positioning POLARIS Global Satellite USA, a satellite communications' company specifically for the offshore industry, offers POLARIS, a new position-reporting device for monitoring and surveillance over Iridium.
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DataPath Has COTM — U.S. Army Needs 'em DataPath, Inc., a worldwide provider of satellite and wireless communications networks has been awarded a delivery order to manufacture and deploy a satellite communications on-the-move (COTM) solution for U.S. Army forces in Iraq.
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DoSee the DoD Comercial SATCOM Users Workshop The 4th annual DoD Comercial SATCOM Users Workshop, to be held at the Bethesda Marriott in Bethesda, Maryland, December 9-11, will bring together leaders from DoD Combatant Commands, Services and Agencies with satellite operators, service providers, resellers, ground equipment suppliers, and manufacturers.
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Goonhilly + HYLAS = New SatAgreement 'Tween Avanti + BT Business Avanti Communications Group plc (AIM: AVN) has entered into a long-term strategic partnership with BT Group plc for the management of HYLAS traffic.
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Canadian Constellation Contract Commissioned To MDA MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) has been awarded a 16-month contract by the Canadian Space Agency that's valued at $40 million to begin the design of the RADARSAT Constellation Mission (RCM).
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November 15, 2008 Don't Go Fishing For A Steelhead When Riverbed Technology Has Landed One Riverbed Technology's (NASDAQ: RVBD) new offering is one that helps government enterprises achieve greater application performance across satellite wide area networks (WANs) while maintaining SCPS (Space Communication Protocol Standards) interoperability.
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It's Good To Be A Repeater With CellAntenna's New QUATTRO Systems CellAntenna Corporation has announced the launch of the Company's newest line of repeater systems, QUATTRO Quad Band Repeater System, which will be on display at MILCOM 2008 at the San Diego Convention Center on November 17-19 at Booth 1739.
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LNA, MBC, + MOS Trio Make MITEQ's Debut List MITEQ Inc. introduces a new addition to its family of waveguide LNAs. The AMFW-8F-17702130-120-23P is a very low noise, high dynamic range Ka-band waveguide front end.
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ABI Research Studies M2M Comm Markets Continued strong growth in M2M (machine-to-machine) communications markets will see about 95 million cellular M2M modules shipping in 2013, according to ABI Research.
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EM Solutions On The Move With SatCom System For Australian Defence EM Solutions has been contracted to develop a Ka-band On-The-Move Satellite Communications System from Round 12 of Australia’s Defence Capability & Technology Demonstrator (CTD) Program. EM Solutions will partner with BAE Systems Australia on the CTD Project.
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Boeing A True Buddy For ISS Boeing [NYSE: BA] engineers played a key role in designing several new components of the International Space Station (ISS) that will transform the outpost from a three-bedroom, one-bath abode for three astronauts into a future five-bedroom, two-bath residence that can accommodate six.
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Gain Bandwidth Without The Hassle Via XipLink's Major Release XipLink has announced their Software Version 2.7 is now generally available. This major release includes substantial improvements to XipLink’s high performance data compression algorithms and can boast bandwidth gains of 200 percent or more for most data types.
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Financially Speaking... Intelsat... Intelsat, Ltd. has reported results for the three-month and combined nine-month periods ended September 30, 2008i.
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Financially Speaking... Spacehab... SPACEHAB, Incorporated (NASDAQ/NMS:SPAB) has released their financial results for the first quarter ended September 30, 2008 of its fiscal year 2009.
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"It's Alive, It's Alive" — Mars Exploration Rover Spirit Has More Spirit! NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit communicated via the Mars Odyssey orbiter today, right at the time when ground controllers had told it to, prompting shouts of "She's talking!" among the rover team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
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Pico-ing Satellite Interest At University of Florida The “pico satellite” being designed and built in a University of Florida (UF) aerospace engineering laboratory may hold a key to a future of easy access to outer space.
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Hubble Discovers Planet While Dusting — Fomalhaut The Gift That Keeps On Giving Say hello to the new kid on the block, as NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has taken the first visible-light snapshot of a planet circling another star. Estimated to be no more than three times Jupiter's mass, the planet, called Fomalhaut b,
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Engine For Ares I Upper Stage Passes Design Review NASA's newest high-performance rocket engine, the J-2X, successfully completed its critical design review Thursday at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
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Ecceliente — SICRAL-1B Lands At Launch Site Now shipped to its launch site after completing integration and testing is the SICRAL-1B satellite.
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NASA Endeavours To DIY, Shoot Crops and Transport Leonardo As you know by now the Endeavour and its seven-member crew lifted off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center at 7:55 p.m. EST Friday to repair and remodel the International Space Station (it was an amazing sight with a full moon illuminating the night.)
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November 14, 2008 STS-126 Mission Launch A Success A successful liftoff on a beautiful evening from Cape Canaveral for the STS-126 Endeavour mission was watched by thousands on NASA TV.
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November 13, 2008 OCO Moved to Vandenberg AFB To Meet Up With Taurus NASA's first spacecraft dedicated to studying carbon dioxide has arrived at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, to begin final launch preparations.
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Com Kits + SatTracking Part Of Blue Sky Network Deal With UAE Blue Sky Network has been selected by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Government to provide flight tracking and voice capabilities aboard selected government operated aircraft.
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Software Disparities Dissipate For TSAT In Demo By Boeing + Raytheon Boeing [NYSE: BA] has successfully demo'd a common software application that can support the space and ground segments of the <i>Transformational Satellite Communications System</i> (TSAT). The demonstration is one of three being conducted by Boeing and partner Raytheon as part of TSAT risk-reduction efforts funded by the U.S. Air Force.
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FAB-T Team Member ViaSat Receives Additional Award From Boeing ViaSat Inc. (Nasdaq: VSAT) has received a subcontract modification from Boeing for the Family of Advanced Beyond-line-of-sight Terminals (FAB-T) program.
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AfricaCom 2008 Gains Thuraya As Sponsor Thuraya will be sponsoring “AfricaCom 2008,” one of the largest telecom gatherings in the African continent. AfricaCom 2008 takes place on the 18th and 19th November in Cape Town, South Africa.
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Demand On ComSats By Military + Government Analyzed By NSR NSR has released their newest market survey and forecast report: Government and Military Demand on Commercial Satellites, 5th Edition. The report provides an in-depth assessment of military and government demand for commercial satellite communications services from 2003-2018 by tracking application requirements around the globe.
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All-Sky Interstellar Boundaries Mapping To Start Soon For NASA's IBEX Just over three weeks since its Oct. 19 launch, NASA’s Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) spacecraft — the first mission designed to image the interaction at the edge of the solar system — concluded its orbit-raising phase and is beginning instrument commissioning in preparation to start science observations.
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A Great GIG For PAR Rome Research Corporation (RRC), a subsidiary of PAR Technology Corporation (NYSE:PTC), was awarded a $3.8 million contract to provide operator level personnel to augment the 21st Signal Brigade supporting operations and maintenance of Army Global Information Grid (GIG) facilities within the continental United States.
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Where, Oh Where, Is NigComSat-1? Right Where It Should Be... Apparently... Last Tuesday, the local media in Nigeria had reported the NigComSat-1 satellite was not present in its orbital slot, quoting "unnamed sources" for the information.
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Saturn's Aurora Captured By Casinni Saturn has its own unique brand of aurora that lights up the polar cap, unlike any other planetary aurora known in our solar system.
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Herschel To Be Simulated + Vacuumed The European Space Agency has reported the Herschel spacecraft is now installed in the Large Space Simulator (LSS) at ESTEC and is now ready for thermal balance and thermal vacuum tests. This is the final system test in the environmental test campaign series.
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LISA Pathfinder Gets Shocked and Double Shocked The ESA's LISA Pathfinder has successfully completed a series of tests devised to characterise the shocks that the spacecraft will experience at launcher separation and when the science and propulsion modules separate upon reaching the operational orbit at L1.
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From Russia To Be Buried It's time to take the space lab and bury it in the Pacific Ocean. The Progress M-65 cargo spacecraft will undock from the International Space Station on Friday evening (November 14, 2008), mission control said on Monday. Russia also said the spacecraft will be used as a "space laboratory" until December 6 or 7 before reentering the Earth's atmosphere and being "buried" in the Pacific Ocean.
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STS-126 Mission Set For Friday Launch All appears to be a "Go" for the launch of shuttle Endeavour this Friday, with the countdown starting last Tuesday at 9:30 p.m. This is the fourth and final mission for this year and is scheduled to liftoff from Kennedy Space Center at 7:55 p.m. on the 14th.
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Final Orbit Positioning Above Moon Completed By ISRO For Chandrayaan-1 India's maiden unmanned lunar spacecraft Chandrayaan-1 has reached its final orbital home, about 100 kms over the moon surface.
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Extension Granted By FCC For Two TerreStar-1 Satellite Milestones TerreStar Corporation (NASDAQ:TSTR) has announced that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) granted a request by TerreStar Networks Inc. (TerreStar) for an extension of its satellite launch milestone from September 30, 2008 to June 30, 2009, and its operational milestone from November 30, 2008 to August 30, 2009.
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Follow-Up To NigComSat-1's Non-Functionality... Or Is The Satellite GOA?? "Gone On Arrival" could be a far better term describing the current "condition" of the NigComSat-1 satellite. In a feature news piece published in Vanguard online dated Lagos, Nigeria, Friday, November 14th, the news site published the following...
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U.S.A.F. Signs Off On SBIRS Delivery From Lockheed Martin The U.S. Air Force has accepted an SBIRS Highly Elliptical Orbit (HEO) system from prime contractor Lockheed Martin, the Company announced Nov. 13.
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November 12, 2008 Amazing UAV Chopper Sees Obstacles Ahead + Avoids Them Carnegie Mellon University — The Robotics Institute funded the following project, whose results were then reported in the International Journal of Robotics Research by Mike Elgersma of Honeywell Labs.
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Navy Has Air Force Handling Initial UAV Training In what could prove to be the first step toward creating a joint RQ-4 Unmanned Aircraft System training unit, pilots of the 1st Reconnaissance Squadron are teaching a class of Navy pilots the Global Hawk system.
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Northrop Grumman Offers Sensing Success With Early Delivery Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) successfully delivered a key sensor for global climate change measurement one week ahead of schedule and on budget.
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Moving On Up @ TECOM Industries... TECOM Industries, Inc., a Smiths Interconnect business, has appointed Arsen Melconian as president.
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NASA's Shock With Dusty Stars Not necessarily what you might think when you imagine stars, and the creation of planets, according to new observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. Shock waves around dusty, young stars might be creating the raw materials for planets; the evidence comes in the form of tiny crystals.
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Righteous Radome From MFG Galileo For NCAOR MFG Galileo Composites, a designer and manufacturer of custom composite radomes and reflectors, has announced the completion of an 18-foot composite radome installation for the government of India’s National Center for Antarctic & Ocean Research (NCAOR).
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Fast Folk At RigNet RigNet, Inc., a provider of managed communications solutions for the upstream oil and gas industry, has been named this year to the <i>Houston Business Journal</i>’s Fast Tech 50 list of leading high-tech businesses.
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ZIN Tech Grabs NASA Award NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland has awarded a contract to ZIN Technologies Inc., of Middleburg Heights, Ohio, for the definition, design, fabrication, assembly, integration, test and operation of a broad array of space flight projects.
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Financially Speaking... Loral Space & Communications Inc... Loral Space & Communications Inc. (Nasdaq:LORL) has announced their financial results for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2008.
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Uplogix and Navix Distribute In Africa Uplogix, a provider of secure remote management (SRM) solutions announced that Navix Distribution has become its first Distributor for South Africa and has already begun working on projects with Managed Service Partners, Financial Service Companies and also Telecommunications Operators.
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UAV Deal In Brazil Contested By Two Arie Egozi reports for Flightglobal that Brazil's defence ministry has expressed its intention to acquire unmanned air vehicles to monitor its borders, with the requirement likely to be contested by Denel's Bateleur and Elbit Systems' Hermes 450 design.
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Financially Speaking... GeoEye... GeoEye, Inc. (NASDAQ: GEOY) has reported the Company's revenues for the third quarter of 2008 were $35.9 million as compared to $53.8 million for the third quarter of 2007.
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A Word Or Two To The FCC From MSV Regarding Redo Of D Block Spectrum Auction In response to the Federal Communications Commission’s plans to conduct a re-auction of the 700 MHz D block spectrum, Mobile Satellite Ventures (MSV) filed comments recommending the expansion of satellite requirements to ensure reliable and interoperable communications to the public safety community. A copy of MSV’s complete filing is available on the FCC web site.
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ART and the Anti-Hacker Card ART (Arab Radio and Television Network), a broadcaster of premium Arabic family programming and entertainment worldwide, will deploy Viaccess' Praha card to secure its Pay TV satellite platforms in the middle east region.
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Iridium OpenPort Testing By Globe Wireless Globe Wireless is currently in final testing with Iridium on the Iridium OpenPort platform.
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SES AMERICOM's IP-PRIME Gets Content Security From Verimatrix Verimatrix has announced SES AMERICOM is adopting the Verimatrix Video Content Authority System (VCAS) for IPTV content security for the IP-PRIME distribution service targeted to North American telecom operators.
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Oil & Gas Comm Topics To Run Rampant At GVF's Upcoming Conference Major providers of ICT services to the regional oil & gas exploration & production (E&P) segment such as (in alphabetical order) CapRock Communications, Hermes Datacomms, iPerintis, Maxis, SAT GE, Schlumberger, ScopeTel, SpeedCast, Telecom Malaysia, and TSAT, have now registered in large numbers to participate in the latest of the?Global VSAT Forum (GVF) and UK-EMP series of Oil & Gas Communications Conferences.
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Mimas Appears Behind Hazy Saturn Rings Here it comes, Mimas emerges from behind hazy Saturn, and you see that the rings appear distorted near the planet as their image passes through the upper atmosphere. The limb of Mimas (396 kilometers, or 246 miles across) is slightly flattened on the left side by the rim of the large crater Herschel.
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The Major WTA Teleport Awards Announced.. The World Teleport Association (WTA) has announced its rankings of the Top Teleport Operators of 2008. These rankings provide a unique look into the diverse teleport sector of the global communications industry. Rankings are reported in three categories: the Global Top Twenty, the Independent Top Twenty, and the Fast Twenty.
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MEO Network To Be Facilitated With iDirect's iDX iDirect, Inc., a company of VT Systems Inc (VT Systems), has announced that it has entered into a technology partnership with O3b Networks Ltd., a newly established satellite operator headquartered in Jersey, U.K.
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November 11, 2008 ThurayaRecharge Proves It Pays To Pre-Pay A new program that should prove most helpful to those in remote areas is underway fromThuraya, that provides a convenient recharging service for pre-paid Thuraya phone users. The new service, ThurayaRecharge, enables subscribers to instantly top up their accounts by phone or online.
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ATK To Make Certain System Works — Failure Is Not An Option For Launch Abort NASA and ATK will conduct the first full-scale test fire of the motor for a new launch abort system at 1:00 p.m. MST, Nov. 20, at the ATK Launch Systems facility in Promontory, Utah.
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A-OK! So Far For Orbital Sciences' OCO Sat For NASA The Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) satellite completed its design, development, manufacturing and testing process at Orbital Sciences Corporation [NYSE: ORB] and is enroute to the final launch site at Vandenberg Air Force Base (VAFB), California.
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Antarctica's Scott Base Has EXPANDed Expand Networks has announced Antarctica NZ, the Crown Entity responsible for developing, managing, and executing New Zealand Government interests in Antarctica and the Southern Ocean, has recently deployed Expand Networks' WAN optimization technology to accelerate satellite communications and deliver impressive savings in satellite bandwidth costs.
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GOES Gets Paloma Shot Hurricane Paloma was well-formed, with distinctive spirals and a clear eye on November 7, 2008, when the GOES satellite captured this image.
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Financially Speaking... ORBCOMM... ORBCOMM Inc. has announced the Company's financial results for the third quarter ended September 30, 2008. Total Revenues for the quarter ended September 2008 were $8.0 million, an increase of 15.3 percent from the third quarter of 2007.
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Little Hope NASA's Phoenix Will Phone Home NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has ceased communications after operating for more than five months. As anticipated, seasonal decline in sunshine at the robot's arctic landing site is not providing enough sunlight for the solar arrays to collect the power necessary to charge batteries that operate the lander's instruments.
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Mars Wanna-Be's Tested By ESA The European Space Agency (ESA) has reported that the crew selection for a simulated Mars mission moved a step closer to completion recently as the last eight candidates are being put through extensive medical screening in Moscow.
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SRC TRACER Capabilities For Predator Type UAVs Shipped To U.S. Army SRC Computers, Inc. has shipped the first on-board signal data processor (SDP) for Lockheed Martin’s Tactical Reconnaissance and Counter-Concealment Enabled Radar (TRACER) program.
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Moving On Up @ L-3 Communications... L-3 Communications (NYSE: LLL) has named John C. McNellis senior vice president and president of the Integrated Systems Group.
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Healthy SatDelivered TV + Digital Convergence In UAE Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "United Arab Emirates - Convergence Broadband & Internet Market" report to their report offerings.
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Markets Primed For IP•PRIME SES AMERICOM has announced that more than 65 telcos in 31 states have signed up for the Company's IP-PRIME service.
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UAV Training To Be Tackled In London By Simlat Simlat will perform an interactive half day advanced workshop during November 19th as part of the upcoming "Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 2008" conference in London, U.K.
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Getting Hotter Is HOT BIRD-9, Now Fueled Satellite preparations for Arianespace's upcoming Ariane 5 launch are moving into their final phase with the fueling HOT BIRD-9, one of two passengers to be orbited on this mission for the Eutelsat telecommunications operator.
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Financially Speaking... EchoStar Corporation... EchoStar Corporation has reported total revenue of $616 million for the quarter ended Sept. 30, 2008, a 52.4 percent increase compared with $404 million for the corresponding period in 2007.
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When Moon and Planet Collide — Prometheus Hits the Edge of Saturn's F Ring When first viewed in the movie sequence, Cassini images reveal the moon Prometheus as it slowly collides with the diffuse inner edge of Saturn's F ring and reminds this viewer of the Silver Surfer cresting on a big wave, only this one is literally out of this world.
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Hughes + DISA Will Dig Into Global Grid Hughes Network Systems, LLC (HUGHES) now has a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) to study Network Centric Enterprise Architecture validation of IP networking with the Regenerative Satellite Mesh (RSM-A) standard and the SPACEWAY 3 system.
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November 10, 2008 Responsibilities For Indian UAV Program Still To Be Sorted Out Rustom, a medium altitude, long endurance, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), has been approved by the Indian Government for development and production. The Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) will select a partner from India as part of this indigenous, Rs.1,000 crore project.
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Musings Over Musis Melds Into Affirmative Launch By France + EU Countries Defense Minister Herv? Morin of France has stated Poland has now joined Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain for a collaborative optical spy satellite launch.
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Brits Not Reaping UAV Data In Afghanistan As They Should According to computing.co.uk's online news source, the U.K.'s Ministry of Defence (MoD) has warned that differing U.S. suppliers' proprietary software standards are hampering the ability of British forces in Afghanistan to make full use of data from unmanned air-reconnaissance vehicles (UAVs).
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Hip Hip Hyper hARRAY For SSTL's CHRIS The CHRIS satellite imager now celebrates 7 years' of scientific success of high resolution hyperspectral satellite imagery. The instrument has been so successful that an advanced variant is under development.
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ISS Captures Craters—On Earth This astronaut photograph was acquired on October 21, 2008, with a Nikon D2Xs digital camera fitted with a 400 mm lens, and is provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations experiment and the Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, Johnson Space Center. The image was taken by the Expedition 17 crew.
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Lockheed Martin In Support + Development Roles For Constellation Program NASA has awarded Lockheed Martin Corp. a $667.3 million contract to provide support for systems used in its newgen rockets designed for human spaceflight.
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Harris Serves Up Multiple PBS HD Services + SatFeeds Harris Corporation's NEXIO server has been selected by Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) as part of a complete upgrade to support multiple HD services.
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Midnight Fireballs! Potentially Hazardous Asteroids, Oh My! November is a most exciting month for activity in space — Midnight Fireballs are visible late at night as Earth is passing through a swarm of gritty debris from comet 2P/Encke causing a slow flurry of Taurid fireballs.
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All About AIS Agreements Awards To ORBCOMM ORBCOMM Inc. has signed eight new test and evaluation agreements with prospective VARs, distribution partners, and potential end-users in connection with its Automatic Identification System (AIS) services.
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DMSP Is Under The Weather Takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin' describes the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) Flight 16 (F16) Block 5D-3 spacecraft, built by Lockheed Martin [NYSE:LMT], which has surpassed five years of on-orbit operations and continues to provide critical weather data to the warfighter — one year beyond its four year design life.
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November 9, 2008 NASA FDOC Goes To Lockheed Martin + Spaceflight Gets Integrated Support NASA has awarded a $667.3 million contract to Lockheed Martin Corp. of Gaithersburg, Md., to provide integrated support for the hardware, software, data and displays used to train for and execute human spaceflight missions.
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Prime Attention Given Boeing By NASA The Boeing Company [NYSE: BA] has been named Large Business Prime Contractor of the Year by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) for its efforts to work with small businesses on the Ares I launch vehicle program.
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November 7, 2008 Entropic Reaches to the Sky The chosen one — Entropic Communications, Inc. announced that BSkyB (Sky) selected Global Invacom to supply its new four-channel satellite channel router (SCR) incorporating Entropic's Channel Stacking Switch (CSS) technology.
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Financially Speaking... ViaSat Inc... ViaSat Inc. (NASDAQ: VSAT) has revealed their financial results for the second quarter of fiscal year 2009.
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Sea Tel Announces Antenna Adds Sea Tel has debuted USAT, the first Ultra Small Aperture Terminal. Building on the Company's recently released 60-cm antenna, model 2406, this smaller, lighter 60-cm antenna system meets the FCC’s and ETSI’s specification allowing multi mode use with Spread Spectrum, TDMA, and SCPC services.
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Looks Great From Up Here! Say DigitalGlobe and deCarta An agreement from a higher altitude describes DigitalGlobe and their contract with deCarta in which DigitalGlobe will provide deCarta’s geospatial platform customers access to its premium, high-resolution satellite and aerial imagery.
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New Partnership For Thuraya Brings Quicklink Tech Into Play Thuraya and Quicklink are partnering to facilitate the transmission and delivery of extremely low latency, real-time broadcast video to users of the ThurayaIP service.
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Chinese' CCTV Parlez-Vouz Francais With GlobeCast Chinese broadcaster CCTV has selected GlobeCast to distribute its French language channel CCTV-F to the European market.
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The Last For This Year + The First For Next Year On Arianespace' Plate The first Ariane 5 for Arianespace’s launch activity next year is taking shape at the Spaceport in French Guiana. This mission joins another heavy-lift launcher that is nearing completion for Arianespace’s final mission of 2008.
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F16 DMSP Working So Well, No New SatLaunch Needed The Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) Flight 16 (F16) Block 5D-3 spacecraft, built by Lockheed Martin [NYSE:LMT], has now surpassed five years of on-orbit operations.
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Casinni Captures Clobbered Janus and Saturn RIngs The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. Some of the craft's latest imagery reveals Saturn's battered moon, Janus, which wears the record of a long history of surface impacts.
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2x New Chinese Satellites Now In Orbit Last Wednesday morning, China placed two satellites into orbit after they were successfully launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China.</font
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Crab Nebula Pierced By Chandra's X-Ray Vision NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory has provided the first clear view of the faint boundary of the Crab Nebula's X-ray-emitting pulsar wind nebula.
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November 6, 2008 Globecomm Grounds for Terminal Celebration Globecomm Systems Inc. [NASDAQ: GCOM], has been awarded a contract from a multi-national organization for satellite ground terminals, valued at approximately $27 million.
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Got The Pacific Covered Says Intelsat Veep @ UN Intelsat, Ltd.'s Vice President for the Asia-Pacific region, David Ball, shared the Company's expertise on ensuring telecommunications connectivity among the nations of the Pacific and addressed attendees of the “Ensuring Pacific Connectivity” meeting at United Nations Headquarters this afternoon.
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Ocean Cruise Over For Ares I — Integration At Kennedy Space Center Starts The first major flight hardware of NASA's Ares I-X rocket has arrived in Florida to begin preparation for the inaugural test flight of the agency's next-generation launch system. The test flight is targeted for July 12, 2009.
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Legal Ruminations... Gilat Satellite Networks... Gilat Satellite Networks Ltd. (Nasdaq: GILT) has filed lawsuits against each of the parties that had guaranteed the payment of a termination fee under the Merger Agreement that was approved by the Company's shareholders on July 3, 2008.
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Honeywell's T-Hawk Tags Threats + This UAV Is Backpackable Honeywell (NYSE: HON) has received a $65 million production contract for the Company's Micro Air Vehicles, known as the T-Hawk system. Each system consists of two T-Hawk vehicles and one ground control unit, spares, training for operators and maintainers, and field support.
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CubeSats Make The Grade For ESA's Vega Launch Following the successful “Vega Maiden Flight CubeSat Workshop” held at ESA/ESTEC in January 2008, which was the first CubeSat workshop to be held at the European-level, the ESA Education Office is pleased to announce the Second European CubeSat Workshop will take place in ESA/ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, from January 20th through the 22nd. 2009.
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One Century After Wright Brothers, Astrium’s Skynet 5 Takes the Gold Hard work is worth the effort when one is rewarded and recognized by their peers; and so it goes, first the Wright Brothers, and most recently, Astrium’s Skynet 5 satellite design and manufacturing team, led by Patrick Wood, FRAeS, the Skynet 5 Project Director. This team has been recognized with two specialist awards from The Royal Aeronautical Society.
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Two Buy Into JSAT MOBILE's Efforts Stratos Global Corporation announced FURUNO Electric Co., Ltd. (FURUNO) and Japan Radio Co., Ltd. (JRC) have become shareholders in JSAT MOBILE Communications Inc.
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Awesome! ASTRA 1M Takes Off On A Breeze Off and away — the fifth Eurostar satellite delivered by Astrium this year, and the second of four satellites built by Astrium for SES Astra, was launched on a Proton Breeze M launch vehicle provided by International Launch Services (ILS) November 6, 02:44 Baikonur time, or November 5, 15:44 EST; 20:44 GMT.
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November 5, 2008 Hold Onto Your Hat! As Ares V Rocket Is Tested While the first test flight for Ares V is slated for 2018, aerodynamic testing already is under way at the Marshall Center's wind tunnel test facility in Building 4732. Engineers at the Marshall Center are taking the first steps in developing the Ares V heavy cargo launch vehicle, which is the heavy lifter of America's next-generation space fleet for the Constellation Program.
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The Flying Eyeball Evolves From NASA NASA is developing technologies that will allow lunar landers to automatically identify and navigate to the location of a safe landing site while detecting landing hazards during the final descent to the surface. This is important because future lunar missions will need this capability to be able to land safely near specific resources that are located in potentially hazardous terrain.
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Fly-By Cassini Skeet Shoots Baghdad Sulcus This Cassini image was the fourth 'skeet shoot' narrow-angle image captured during the October 31, 2008, flyby of Saturn's moon Enceladus. The source region for jet VI (see PIA08385) has been identified.
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Tata Nods At NDS + Empowers SatSubs With Feature Filled Functionality NDS Group plc and Tata Sky Ltd. bring new functionality to Tata Sky+ subscribers.
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Stratos Begins New BGAN-Based SCADA Service Stratos Global Corp., introduced its new BGAN SCADA service to provide high-performance connectivity for remote, unmanned SCADA applications.
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No Gain = No Customer Joy, DEV Brings Strength To Less Robust Signals DEV Systemtechnik has upgraded the optical receiver module DEV 7312 with a Manual Gain Control (MGC) to ensure trouble-free distribution of weak signals.
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WIN-T Win For U.S. Army Via General Dynamics C4 Systems... General Dynamics C4 Systems recently completed delivery of the first WIN-T Increment 1 equipment to the U.S. Army. Increment 1 builds on the former Joint Network Node-Network (JNN) and provides soldiers with a high-capacity, reliable, secure communications network when they are stopped or "at the halt."
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MSS Services Around The Globe Analyzed In Latest NSR Report NSR has released its newest market survey and forecast report: Mobile Satellite Services, 4th Edition. The report covers eight global regions for MSS equipment and services, as well as transponder demand for satellite handhelds, narrowband and broadband solutions, mobile satellite TV, and MSS-ATC/CGC for the period 2006-2017.
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Moon Maneuver Made By Chandrayaan-1 The fifth and final orbit raising maneuver of Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft was successfully carried out on November 4th at 04:56 a.m. IST.
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Working With a Dragon(Lab), SpaceX Conducts How-To Workshop If you're in the market for a free-flying, reusable spacecraft capable of hosting pressurized and unpressurized payloads to and from space, head over to Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) where they are introducing DragonLab™ a new commercial product that will launch to orbit aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle.
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Lockheed Martin's GPS III Gains Review Success The Lockheed Martin [NYSE: LMT] team developing the nexgen Global Positioning System (GPS) spacecraft, known as GPS III, has successfully completed on-schedule an Integrated Baseline Review (IBR) with the U.S. Air Force, an important program milestone that precedes the Preliminary Design Review.
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Tracker UAV To Receive New Compression Technology ATEME(TM) SA offers MPEG-4/H.264 video compression technology and the Company has signed a contract with EADS for the supply of video solutions for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV).
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NOAA-N Prime Time The latest polar-orbiting operational environmental weather satellite developed by NASA for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, called NOAA-N Prime, arrived Tuesday at Vandenberg AFB in California by C-5A military cargo aircraft.
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New BGAN SCADA Service + Support From Stratos Stratos Global Corp. has introduced its new BGAN SCADA service to provide high-performance connectivity for remote, unmanned SCADA applications.
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TT&C For CLCS Is Harris Win Harris Corporation (NYSE:HRS) has revealed NASA Kennedy Space Center has selected the Company's OS/COMET telemetry, tracking, and command (TT&C) software for the Constellation Launch Control System. OS/COMET is a commercial off-the-shelf software tool that provides TT&C capabilities for military, intelligence, and commercial satellite constellations.
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Financially Speaking... Eutelsat... Eutelsat Communications (ISIN: FR0010221234 - Euronext Paris: ETL) has reported its revenue figures for the first quarter ended September 30, 2008.
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RRsat Gains Bezeq In Total Acquisition Of Assets RRsat Global Communications Network Ltd. (NASDAQ:RRST) has completed the acquisition of the satellite business of Bezeq, The Israel Telecommunications Corp. Limited, for approximately $15 million in cash.
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Thales Spanish Sub Selected To Aid Kopernikus Sentinel Sats Thales Alenia Space' Spanish subsidiary Thales Alenia Space Espa?a has been selected to supply the X-band communication subsystems and the S-band TT&C transponders for the first three Sentinel observation satellites in the European Space Agency's Kopernikus program (formerly known as GMES - Global Monitoring for Environment and Security.)
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CapRock Caps New GoM Service With NetSpot CapRock Communications has launched NetSpot, their newest value-added service offering for the energy industry. NetSpot is an on-demand wireless Internet service designed for rigs located in the Gulf of Mexico equipped with CapRock's turnkey VSAT solution.
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Mini UAV Used In Nordic Disaster Exercise A major disaster recovery exercise in Scandinavia relied on Inmarsat BGAN to send vital images to help emergency responders worldwide. The Triplex 2008 event on the border of Sweden and Norway used an unmanned aircraft (UAV) to survey the "disaster zone".
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Get those Sat Apps Received and Processed... Scopus will demonstrate its integrated receiver processor (IRP), an innovative technology platform for advanced receiving and processing applications, at Inter BEE 2008.
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Awesome! ASTRA 1M Takes Off On A Breeze Off and away — the fifth Eurostar satellite delivered by Astrium this year, and the second of four satellites built by Astrium for SES Astra, was launched on a Proton Breeze M launch vehicle provided by International Launch Services (ILS) November 6 02:44 Baikonur time, or November 5, 15:44 EST; 20:44 GMT.
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November 4, 2008 Pakistan Suffers Major Quake — TSF Establishes Communication A 6.5 magnitude earthquake that occurred on October 29 in Pakistan saw terrible losses, both in human and material measures. According to local authorities, 321 people have killed and 603 seriously injured (with as many as 311 and 350 in the Ziarat area alone). In total, more than 130,000 people have been affected.
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UAS Payloads Presentations Primed For San Diego Conference As the number of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UASs) continue to multiply, so does the need for highly advanced payload technologies to support these systems.
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RUAG Rolls Onwards + Upwards Following the sale of the Swedish space company Saab Space and its Austrian subsidiary Austrian Aerospace by SAAB AB to Swiss technology group RUAG, the companies are now united under one name: RUAG Aerospace.
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Do Tell, Sea Tel... Sea Tel, Inc. has announced a branding change on all current and new Sea Tel products with the addition of Cobham’s name to the new Sea Tel logo.
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To The Rescue Comes Harris + EMOCS Harris Corporation (NYSE:HRS) is presenting the design of its portable, emergency air traffic communications and control solution for low-altitude rescue aircraft during the 53rd Annual ATCA Conference and Exposition in Washington D.C., from November 2nd through 5th.
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JPL and NASA's Ghostly Galaxy Photos "Like the Living Dead" An interesting concept for sure — here you see a side-by-side comparison of visible and ultraviolet light as NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer has lifted the veil off a ghost known to haunt the local universe, providing new insight into the formation and evolution of galaxies.
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IDC To SatDeliver Flicks To Europe International Datacasting Corporation has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with OpenSky, based in Italy, for the provision of IDC's broadband satellite technology for the rollout of a new digital cinema distribution network in Europe.
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Thuraya Has A Fort in Hungary To further strengthen its presence in European markets and boost partnership with its key Service Providers, Thuraya has recently appointed Fort Info Technology as a National Service Provider in Hungary.
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Financially Speaking... Sky... Sky profit has increased by 21 percent for the three months ended September 30th. The Company experienced net customer growth of 87,000, up 5 percent year on year, to 9.067 million with new customer additions of 334,000, up 2 percent year on year.
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Oh Canada! MSV Selects Telesat for Next Gen Sats In-Orbit Operations Mobile Satellite Ventures (MSV) and its joint venture partner Mobile Satellite Ventures (Canada) Inc. have selected Telesat to manage in-orbit operations of both the MSV-1 and MSV-2 next-generation satellites to be launched into respective U.S. and Canadian orbital slots.
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Lack Of Sun Weakening Phoenix Lander NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has communicated with controllers daily since Oct. 30 through relays to Mars orbiters.
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DigitalGlobe and NAVTEQ Offer Big Development for Developers Good synergy, if you're not too tired of trendy terminology, but that's what best describes DigitalGlobe and NAVTEQ announcing a new relationship aimed at providing better support to the thousands of software developers using NAVTEQ map data who want to include high-resolution satellite and aerial imagery from DigitalGlobe in their applications.
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RigNet Enjoys Fast Ride to the Top While some businesses find it a struggle to move ahead, such is not the cast with RigNet, Inc., a leading global provider of managed communication services for the upstream oil and gas industry, which has been selected for the third consecutive year by Deloitte & Touche LLP as one of the 50 fastest growing technology companies in the state of Texas.
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November 3, 2008 STS-126 Mission Set NASA managers completed a review Thursday of space shuttle Endeavour's readiness for flight and selected the official launch date for the STS-126 mission. Commander Chris Ferguson and his six crewmates are scheduled to lift off to the International Space Station at 7:55 p.m. EST on Nov. 14.
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Back In Biz Is Hardy Hubble The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has returned to operation and, as if to prove the case, has taken a snapshot of the fascinating galaxy pair Arp 147.
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"Greener" Space Could Be In The Offing From Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) has a new spacecraft engine that is truly "green". The engine is fueled by non-toxic propellants combining liquid oxygen and liquid methane.
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Kaveri-Powered UAV Is India's Aim The move toward unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) is certainly one with intense international interest.
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Aerospace Company Consortium's UAV's Winning Ways In West Wales The ASTRANEA aerospace program has completed a major demonstration of autonomous aircraft technology at ParcAberporth in west Wales.
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Marriage Of VSAT + Antenna Provides Maritime Solution Marlink is going to purchase the WaveCall brand from Sea Tel and will package its maritime VSAT solution and full-service support network with the latter's Sea Tel 4006 Ku-band antenna system.
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United Space Alliance Receives ISS Support Award NASA has awarded a $206.5 million contract to United Space Alliance of Houston to provide mission and flight crew operations support for the International Space Station and human space exploration activities after the space shuttle is retired.
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D Block Minimum Bid Should Be Lowered, Urges TIA... The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) has urged the FCC to reduce or eliminate its proposed D Block minimum bid.
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MENA Fill Rates Fare Well According To Euroconsult + LSE Euroconsult and The London Satellite Exchange, Ltd. (LSE) believe fill rates will remain extremely high, providing a degree of protection from the economic downturn, in particular in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) where capacity shortages are currently readily apparent.
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Congrats To EMS Technologies For 40 Big Ones Forty years ago as of November 1st, EMS Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: ELMG) opened their doors as a technology engineering company in Norcross, Georgia.
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Pan-African Com Parlay Event With 11 years of event leadership, more than 3,500 participants, 180 exhibitors, and 80 expert speakers, AfricaCOM is the flagship event within the Com World Series and the premiere pan-African communications event.
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Cuba Receives Glonass Invitation From Russia Igor Shchegolev, the Communications Minister of Russia, has invited Cuba to become a member of Glonass, the Russian equivalent of the U.S. GPS system.
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Techs At Baikonur Prepping Launch Vehicle For Telstar-11N Telstar-11N, a Ku-band satellite packing 39 high-power, Ku-band transponders that's being built by Space Systems/Loral for Telesat, will connect three continents when occupying its orbital slot at 15 degrees W: North America, Western Europe, and Africa.
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