UK-based In-Space Missions Limited, which is supported by the UK and European Space Agencies, designs, builds, and operates satellites and plans space missions for clients all over the world. Its Faraday Phoenix spacecraft is flying on Spaceflight’s upcoming SXRS-5 (SpaceX’s Transporter-2) mid-2021.
Faraday Phoenix incorporates payloads from six customers across large corporations, small and medium sized businesses, and government organizations. Faraday Phoenix is part of a series of missions which will include both dedicated customer missions and more payload rideshares launching approximately every six months starting early 2022. Future iterations will focus on uploadable customer payloads in the Faraday Digital series.
“Our Faraday mission concept offers a satellite rideshare for customers who want to quickly demonstrate their technology by taking a ‘slot’ on board rather than having to build and manage an entire spacecraft and launch for themselves,” said Ed Stevens, Director of Space Systems at In-Space Missions.
After an 8-month development timeline, the In-Space team is excited for launch with Spaceflight and seeing Faraday Phoenix reach its destination orbit and send its first data back.
“It was an easy decision to work with Spaceflight to manage all aspects of the launch based on the great experience working with them in the past, and their availability of launches at the right time for us,” added Stevens. “We can now get customer technology on orbit faster because of the many launch options Spaceflight offers, and at a more reasonable cost than having to buy an entire vehicle ourselves. We can speed up the launch process which ultimately translates into our customers getting to revenue-generating phases in months versus years — and that’s a tremendous value.”
Despite challenging conditions, the teams orchestrated their mission plans on schedule. “The Spaceflight mission management team has been fantastic at overcoming any and all obstacles created by the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting travel restrictions,” said Stevens. “This was particularly evident in their willingness to undertake our final flight preparations for us in order to protect the mission schedule. Spaceflight’s helpful and professional approach is appreciated at all times, and it’s always a pleasure to work with Marcy, our Mission Manager. We’re really looking forward to the upcoming launch, and many more missions in the coming years.”