VEGA supports ESA-led global network for amateur ground
stations
29 January 2010 – VEGA, a Finmeccanica company, has been
contracted by ESA to provide the system engineering and technical
management for a global education Space project that encourages
collaboration between universities around the world and amateur
radio enthusiasts.
Global Educational Network for Satellite Operations (GENSO) is a
system that links mission controllers, such as universities, with
remote ground stations on a worldwide scale. VEGA was selected by
ESA’s education department to lead the software system engineering
and technical management, in order to bring industry expertise and
help deliver the system.
GENSO will track the orbit of small satellites and CubeSats
(10cm cubed satellites), enabling universities to receive more data
from their respective satellite missions and increase the
opportunities for communicating with their spacecraft. The majority
of the work is being carried out by student teams across Europe,
plus Japan and California (supported by JAXA and NASA
respectively).
As the project’s technical lead, VEGA recently supervised the
first beta software release, and will continue supporting GENSO
into 2010.
VEGA engineer, Phil Beavis, said: “The GENSO project has dual
aims. The first is to develop a software for a global network of
ground stations and mission control centres. The second is to have
the work done by international teams of university students and
volunteers collaborating via the internet, as a valuable
educational exercise in its own right.
“Working with students can mean a high turnover of developers,
and they naturally lack experience in delivering production-quality
software. However, the project does attract wonderfully talented
and committed people. It’s an inspiring and challenging project
that we are privileged to be part of.”
Further information
For further information, please contact Karen Rogers at VEGA on
karen.rogers@vega.co.uk.