Planet Labs earth imaging satellites

[Jcc]

Planet Labs is a San Francisco based startup that is about to launch a constellation of nano-sized earth imaging satellites. They are amazingly tiny, (10cm x 10cm x 30cm) of which 2/3 of the volume is the lens for the camera. I met two of the designers at a conference recently, and got some technical details not mentioned in most of the news articles. Some highlights:

- the satellites have no propulsion, just a reaction wheel to adjust the attitude
- they use a magnetic compass and a "simple" star tracker to determine the correct attitude
- they will be launched from the ISS, so will follow a similar orbit and only cover the portion of the earth overflown by the ISS ( the great majority of the populated regions)
- they will be constantly collecting imagery, and download when passing over a receiving station
- some of the receiving station owners have agreed to barter the download capability in exchange for imagery.
- the imagers are simple Bayer pattern CCDs, capturing frame images at fixed time intervals.
- they plan to georeference and mosaic the imagery on the Amazon cloud.
- they have already launched 2 prototypes, one on the Antares first launch (that was in a low orbit and has already reentered). The other was launched from Baikonur on one of the Russian launchers, that is still in orbit and functioning
- the first operational constellation is planned to launch on Orb-1 to the ISS in December (28 satellites).

Ref:
http://planet-labs.com/
http://www.space.com/22622-planet-labs-dove-satellite-photos.html

[Danderman]

I have got some confirmations and clarifications from the GAUSS UniSat-5 team:

Four Cubesats (PUCPSAT, I-CUBE 1, HUMSAT-D, Dove-4) and four PocketQubeSats (BeakerSat, QBScout, WREN and $50Sat) are on board of UniSat-5

I believe that Dove-4 is a Planet Labs payload.

[jongoff]

Looks like Planetlabs just closed a $52M Series B financing round:
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2013/12/18/planet-labs-raises-52-million-series-financing/

Add that to their existing ~$20M round, and they're closing in on the $100M SkyBox has raised to-date. I think their next 28 satellites are being launched on this next Cygnus flight, and will be deployed via the NanoRacks JEM RMS launcher (can't remember the exact name for it right now).

~Jon

[Danderman]

Looks like Planetlabs just closed a $52M Series B financing round:
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2013/12/18/planet-labs-raises-52-million-series-financing/

Add that to their existing ~$20M round, and they're closing in on the $100M SkyBox has raised to-date. I think their next 28 satellites are being launched on this next Cygnus flight, and will be deployed via the NanoRacks JEM RMS launcher (can't remember the exact name for it right now).

~Jon

Yep. The 28 Planet Labs CubeSATs are part of the 95 kg late load cargo that is now being removed from Antares.

[pericynthion]

Yep. The 28 Planet Labs CubeSATs are part of the 95 kg late load cargo that is now being removed from Antares.

I believe our Flock is staying on board rather than being offloaded, since it's not perishable and is apparently near the bottom of the stack of cargo.  If you've heard otherwise, I'd be interested in any info.

[QuantumG]

Wow, it's so refreshing to see a small space company announcing financing.

[Danderman]

Yep. The 28 Planet Labs CubeSATs are part of the 95 kg late load cargo that is now being removed from Antares.

I believe our Flock is staying on board rather than being offloaded, since it's not perishable and is apparently near the bottom of the stack of cargo.  If you've heard otherwise, I'd be interested in any info.

All I have is the statement that the late access cargo was being unloaded.

[savuporo]

70 million for "toys" that can't do "jack squat".

I want to be in toy business

[Lar]

70 million for "toys" that can't do "jack squat".

I want to be in toy business

What? These sound like rather remarkable devices and if they stay in orbit for very long, they can develop rather detailed images. Not toys at all. 

Further, if these prove out lots of other types of sensors could be fitted and lots of other orbits seeded. We'd hvae a cloud of information gathering devices sending lots of great data down.

[savuporo]

Sorry I made a sarcastic reference to another heated thread here - should have linked/clarified.
I personally consider Planet Labs a great breakthrough in space business.

[Lar]

Ah ok cool, thanks!

It will be interesting to see how far clusters of cheap things can be taken in this realm... in the computer business big racks of commodity hardware so cheap you don't repair, just replace, individual units, have taken everything by storm. Will that idea transfer to data gathering, to communication? We'll see. I'm betting yes.

[Melt Run]

Another start up launches small sats is Skybox with sats around the size of a dorm frig.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/06/startup-skybox/
This video shows the launch on a Russian ICBM
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jsfL19FV3qg&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DjsfL19FV3qg

[baldusi]

Capitan Beto and Manolito (CubeBug-1 and CubeBug-2) were made to qualify parts for their own (Satellogic's) microsats.

[pericynthion]

Capitan Beto and Manolito (CubeBug-1 and CubeBug-2) were made to qualify parts for their microsats.

Hm?  While we wish the CubeBug folks every success, they have no affiliation with Planet Labs.

[baldusi]

Capitan Beto and Manolito (CubeBug-1 and CubeBug-2) were made to qualify parts for their microsats.

Hm?  While we wish the CubeBug folks every success, they have no affiliation with Planet Labs.

The previous post was about Skybox. So I mentioned the third company based on the same concept. And they are not affiliated but there was a relationship among the three companies.

[pericynthion]

OK, it was the word 'their' that threw me off...

[Danderman]

Just to note that 28 of these were carried into orbit today.

[Danderman]

Bay area is the hotbed of Earth observation technology start-ups, generating a new ‘space race’

http://photos.mercurynews.com/2014/02/04/photos-bay-area-is-the-hotbed-of-earth-observation-technology-start-ups-generating-a-new-space-race

Three Bay area start-ups are at the forefront of the new ‘space race,’ the charge to completely change the way we can observe Earth and the global processes and forces at work. Companies like UrtheCast, Planet Labs and Skybox Imaging produce small, relatively inexpensive satellites and high-resolution cameras capable of streaming video and still pictures back to Earth which can be downloaded, observed and analyzed in real-time. These video and photographic products allow the observation of environmental and humanitarian programs as make it possible for corporate ‘big data’ customers, such as ‘big-box’ retailers who might use the video streams, for instance, to detect the high and low traffic patterns into and out of their properties

[Blackstar]

Bay area is the hotbed of Earth observation technology start-ups, generating a new ‘space race’

and high-resolution cameras

This term gets thrown around a lot without much definition. For the military, "high resolution" means about 0.1 meter ground resolution. For commercial imaging, it generally means better than 1 meter ground resolution (and in common usage probably means better than 0.5 meter ground resolution).

[Danderman]

Bay area is the hotbed of Earth observation technology start-ups, generating a new ‘space race’

and high-resolution cameras

This term gets thrown around a lot without much definition. For the military, "high resolution" means about 0.1 meter ground resolution. For commercial imaging, it generally means better than 1 meter ground resolution (and in common usage probably means better than 0.5 meter ground resolution).

Skybox Imaging, one of the three companies mentioned in the article, provides "sub-meter" resolution imagery.