SpaceX successfully launched today SmallSat Express to a low Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 4E (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Air Force Base. Carrying 64 payloads, this mission represented the largest single rideshare mission from a U.S.-based launch vehicle to date. A series of six deployments occurred approximately 13 to 43 minutes after liftoff, after which Spaceflight began to command its own deployment sequences. Spaceflight’s deployments are expected to occur over a period of six hours.

Rohde & Schwarz has acquired Pixel Power Limited, a Cambridge, UK- based company, which offers innovative graphics, master control and integrated playout systems for broadcasters and playout facilities. These systems enable dynamic content to be delivered more efficiently for linear TV, mobile, online and OTT/VOD.

The GVF-EMP Partnership ‘HTS Roundtable 2018 - GEOs... MEOs... LEOs: Enabling a Brave New World’ (www.uk-emp.co.uk/current-events/hts-roundtable-2018/), has declared a pre-registration full house for the 4th December programme at London’s Strand Palace Hotel.

Advantech Satellite Networks, an established vendor and global market leader of broadband satellite communications systems announced here at the Africacom Conference and Exhibition that it will now be doing business as Spacebridge Inc.

The company provides satellite equipment and services for deploying satellite communication networks: VSAT HUBs, VSAT Terminals in Point-to-Point, Point-to-Multi-Point, mesh topologies as well as SCPC and broadcast modems.

Boeing [NYSE: BA] and Safran [EPA: SAF] have received regulatory approvals for a joint venture so they can begin designing, building and servicing aircraft Auxiliary Power Units (APUs)—onboard engines that are primarily used to start the main engines and power aircraft systems while on the ground and, if necessary, in flight. The companies also named Etienne Boisseau as Chief Executive Officer of the joint venture.

In the last quarter of 2018 a real small sat express consisting of the Indian PSLV and the American SpaceX Falcon-9 launchers will bring a large number of small satellites into an sun synchronous orbit.  After long delays more than 80 small satellites from more than 30 customers from around 20  countries,  that are waiting anxiously to have their small satellites launched into orbit.

Introduction

A man walking along a cliff feels the ground give way beneath him.  He manages to clutch at a root extending from the face of the cliff, which saves him from falling 1,200 feet onto jagged rocks in the surf below. But as he hangs, on he cannot climb back up.  He shouts, “Is anyone up there!?” 

A voice fills the sky!  “Have faith. If you have faith you can let go and you will fall light as a feather, landing unhurt on the rocks below.”  He looks down at the rocks and crashing surf, thinks about it, looks back up and shouts, “Is there anyone ELSE up there?”

Comtech Telecommunications Corp. (“Comtech”) (NASDAQ:CMTL) announced today that it entered into a new US$ 550.0 million credit facility (the “Credit Facility”) with a syndicate of lenders on October 31, 2018. The Credit Facility consists of a senior secured revolving loan facility with a borrowing limit of US $300.0 million and an accordion feature allowing the Company to borrow up to an additional $250.0 million, plus additional amounts subject to pro forma covenant compliance.

In my previous column I referenced the GVF’s contribution to the forthcoming International Telecommunication Union’s World Radiocommunication Seminar 2018 (WRS2018), December 3rd to 7th, which will take the form of a pre-Seminar Workshop Symposium, November 29th to 30th, focused on capacity building amongst the world’s regulators. A number of organizations will be supporting and contributing to the Workshop Symposium, including (at the time of writing) Hughes and SES, together with other GVF members currently finalizing their inputs.

The latest program in the GVF-EMP Partnership portfolio, the HTS Roundtable 2018 - GEOs… MEOs… LEOs: Enabling a Brave New World, has been released.