Hi all,
First, an update on the upcoming SpaceCom event this week:
SpaceCom in Houston, Texas 21-22 November. America’s Commercial Space Conference and Exhibition. John and Martin will be there on the AmbaSat booth, #655. Lots happening between the Monday and Thursday. We are semi-finalists in the entrepreneur section at SpaceCom and will be pitching to potential investors.
John and Martin will be attending an invitation-only dinner hosted by Google on the Monday evening. During Tuesday and Wednesday we have been invited to present AmbaSat to NASA representatives.
We will have production-ready AmbaSat-1 satellite boards available to purchase from the exhibition booth, plus some goodies to give away.
More information is available about SpaceCom here:
Now onto a progress update on delivery of the kits:
First, an apology. It’s taken a little longer to test the production version of the AmbaSat-1 satellite board and so our delivery date target has slipped a little. However, the good news is that the testing has gone very well and late last we took delivery of the first 200 production-ready satellite boards (picture below). We also have 7 of the 8 sensor boards complete, with the final GPS sensor board currently under review.
Next steps are to arrange assembly and partial assembly of the boards and components. We will pre-solder all the MCU and gyro/accel/magneto chips unless requested otherwise. Our chosen assembly partner is Mowden Controls, located very close to the AmbaSat office in Yorkshire. Thanks to Andrew and the team at Mowden for all your help.
We’ll then begin packaging the kits and fully assembled boards ready for dispatch.
John and Martin are in the US during the coming week. Marcel is working on the detail screens for the AmbaSat Dashboard. Dan is working on the licensing and legal aspects of the launch. We meet with Randa and her team at Interorbital Systems in Nevada next week – our rocket launch partner. A special thanks to Randa who has been very helpful and supportive. Wannapa is working on coding examples and packaging. Sudu our electronics guru has been a great help in the satellite sensor design. Thanks also to JohnM and Alan in their guidance and advice on design.
So, when will the kits be ready? Tentatively we are aiming for December, with an actual date over the coming weeks.
We still have much to do, especially on the licensing and launch front. UK Space have given us a rating of ‘amber’. This means the fundamental project is good but with some reservations. They have asked for 1 year of notice prior to launch. Consequently, we are working on plan B to licence in the USA. As part of the process we have setup AmbaSat LLC as an American business and Dan is working through the requirements and we have several meetings lined-up during our USA trip.
So, this coming week is going to be busy with the exhibition and more. However, our focus is always on supporting and delivering to our backers. There is tremendous interest in AmbaSat and we will do our utmost to keep you all updated during this coming week.
As always, thank you for your support. We are all part of something that is going to be at the forefront of future space exploration. Interesting times for us all.
The AmbaSat team.
P.S. Jenny is handling communications whilst we are in the US. If you would like to get in touch, please email jenny@ambsat.com and she will make sure your messages/questions get to the right people.
