The design process of the Iridium NEXT constellation is moving on at pace with the recent news that S3 group has been selected to develop a new custom Integrated Circuit for use in the Iridium NEXT system.

S3 are long standing technical parters for Iridium, having played a key role in the development of the 9602 Short burst data product. Their new design win will see them develop an Iridium Radio Frequency (RF) customer Integrated Circuit to allow next generation Iridium communications devices to deliver the upgraded services enabled by the NEXT system.

Iridium NEXT will enable higher data speeds as well as powerful new services and devices when it launches in 2015. Like all Iridium partners we’re keeping a very close eye on NEXT developments and are pleased to hear that the design process is moving ahead and that everything is on schedule for 2015.

Long awaited news came in over the Christmas period confirming that Globalstar had successfully launched six of its new second generation satellites from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The new satellites were launched using the Soyuz-Fregat version of the Soyuz launch vehicle on Wednesday 28th December. Each of the six new vehicles was successfully injected into a low earth orbit of around 920km and the company has confirmed that in-orbit testing is underway and that all of the new satellites are operating as they should be.

It’s very welcome news for Globalstar as their planned upgrades have been beset by financial and technical troubles and unscheduled delays. The launch is the third of a planned series of four that will enable Globalstar to roll out the world’s finest quality mobile satellite and voice services. The new satellites have been designed with a 15 year life expectancy, twice as long as the spacecraft they replace.

“It is with great pleasure that we announce the successful third launch and continued deployment of our second-generation constellation,” said Tony Navarra, President of Global Operations for Globalstar, Inc. “We are now only one launch away from completing our four second-generation satellite launches and we look forward to the future services our new constellation will support. With these six new satellites now safely in orbit, we once again congratulate and applaud all of our Globalstar employees world-wide and thank launch provider Arianespace as well as our satellite contractor Thales Alenia Space for this launch success.”

The team at Wireless Innovation would like to offer our congratulations to Globalstar. They are a valued partner and we look forward to continued success.

It’s been a mixed few weeks for Globalstar as the company strives to gets its second generation satellite network off the ground. We had encouraging news earlier in the month when it was revealed that the satellites had been registered with the UN and saw reports that the operator had switched on its ground stations in the US, Canada and Mexico. All of this seems to have been done in the nick of time as Globalstar raced to meet various loan related deadlines. A huge sigh of relief all round.

Unfortunately, we hear now that there’s been a setback. It seems that, following a launch failure on August 24th, Russian Space Agency, (Roscosmos) officials have decided that nothing gets off the ground until all Soyuz 2.1a launch vehicles have undergone detailed inspections. This seems likely to push back the scheduled mid-October launch date to December.

This is the third scheduled launch in Globalstar’s $1bn network upgrade and is a significant part of the company’s future growth plans. As a long standing Globalstar partner we’re keen to see the new constellation up and running along with the promise of new and exciting services yet to be announced  will be watching closely as the next scheduled launch date approaches

Wireless Innovation have been appointed by NI Water to provide cost effective satellite telemetry links to a number of new Wastewater Pumping Stations that were unable to be covered by the existing scanning radio network.

Wireless Innovation Ltd a leading supplier of remote data communication solutions to the water industry proposed their industry proven MiChrosat 2400 dial up satellite solution. The MiChrosat 2400 system uses the Iridium LEO (Low Earth Orbit) satellite constellation which provides cost effective telemetry dial up anywhere in the world.

The installation was simple with the MiChrosat antenna (does not require any alignment) mounted on a similar column as used for the scanning radio network and the MiChrosat satellite modem mounted in the same street cabinet alongside the outstation.

The outstation a Serck PX 24 is connected to the MiChrosat 2400 unit via a single serial (RS232) cable. The Wastewater Pumping Station is polled on a 24 hour schedule via a centrally site installed MiChrosat 2400 which is connected to the Master Station System. The outstation utilises exception reporting so that should an alarm condition occur between schedule polls the outstation will automatically wake up the MiChrosat 2400 and initiate the transfer of the alarm state to the Master Station System.

The Michrosat 2400 connected to the Master Station System enables the calls to remain within the satellite network thereby minimising call costs as well as insulating the satellite network from any external fault conditions. Further MiChrosat 2400 Satellite Modems mounted at Wastewater Pumping Stations will utilise the same MiChrosat 2400 connected to the Master Station System.