Swedish company will sell laser terminals for satellites from TNO – IT Pro – News

The Swedish company AAC Clyde Space will produce and sell laser satellite communications terminals developed by TNO. AAC and TNO have entered into a licensing agreement for this purpose. For example, space laser stations need to be commercialized.

the agreement It applies for twenty years And have AAC Clyde Space produce terminals that can be used on satellites. The stations are 10 x 10 x 10cm in size and are suitable for small satellites, “which AAC Clyde Space specializes in”. The Swedish company wants to produce the laser station on a large scale.

AAC Clyde Space will collaborate with FSO Instruments regarding the terminals. This is a Dutch company with which TNO also has an agreement. FSO will manufacture optical heads, optical banks and a “rough dot alignment system” for the laser stations.

TNO has been working on space laser stations for some time and previously collaborated with the Norwegian space organization NOSA to launch the Norsat-TD satellite with a laser station. In January this year, TNO was able to connect this satellite to TNO’s optical ground station in The Hague for the first time. “This successful field test represents the world’s first for rapid optical communication with the Earth using a small, lightweight optical terminal with Dutch technology,” TNO wrote.

According to TNO, laser satellite communication is faster and safer than current radio frequencies used for satellite communications. Laser communications will be a hundred to a thousand times faster. The safety improvement is said to be due to the laser beams being “extremely narrow”, as opposed to “wide radio signals”. This means that laser signals are difficult to intercept. Laser communications can be used with fixed ground stations, aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles. TNO expects global demand for laser communications to grow significantly in the “near future,” due in part to “increasing demand for commercial and government data.” TNO does not report how much the AAC pays for the licensing agreement.