The company says it plans make its network the largest commercial optical sensor network for LEO observation in the world, providing optical tracking of LEO objects at scale.
Specifically, by the end of 2023, Slingshot plans to deploy 80 new optical sensors, which include proprietary telescopes and ultra-wide field of view sensors. This will bring its total network to more than 200 sensors across 20 sites globally.
With services aimed at government organisations and satellite operators, it will increase Slingshot’s daily LEO observations by 100x, resulting in more than one million observations per day.
The expansion will include two new Southern Hemisphere sites, with additional sensors being added to many of the existing sites.
“We are making Slingshot’s Global Sensor Network the go-to commercial space surveillance and tracking provider for all orbital regimes,” said Melanie Stricklan, Co-founder and CEO, Slingshot Aerospace. “This expansion introduces an unprecedented level of space situational awareness that gives operators the critical insights they need for successful space operations.”
Numerica SDA
In August last year it acquired Numerica Corporation’s Space Domain Awareness (SDA) division, which included a commercial low Earth orbit (LEO) to geosynchronous orbit (GEO) daytime and nighttime optical sensor network for satellite tracking.
It comprised 150 sensors and 30 telescopes in 20 locations around the globe.
Slingshot Aerospace
Slingshot Aerospace was founded in 2017 and is based in Austin, Texas and El Segundo, California.
It specialises in space situational awareness (think collision avoidance and space traffic management). Its decision making systems – Slingshot Beacon and Slingshot Laboratory – bring together data streams from sources such as satellites and the ground-based sensors, to help companies visualise and analyse the positions of objects in space.
Slingshot Beacon, pictured top, is described by Slingshot as the world’s first collision avoidance collaboration and communications platform for space, de-risking conjunctions and saving operators time.
The company writes:
“Slingshot’s Global Sensor Network generates precise angular and brightness data that provides additional context beyond existing LEO radar tracking capabilities. Angular data enables enhanced orbital state generation (how the object is moving), while brightness data enables object characterization and change detection. The Slingshot Global Sensor Network leverages proprietary sensors with daytime LEO tracking capabilities that allow for 5x the observation opportunities of night-only systems. This increased observation window provides customers with more frequent observations of their satellites and objects of interest. The expansion also adds additional redundancy to the network that further mitigates any intermittent weather outages which are historically associated with smaller electro-optical observation networks.”
See also: Slingshot Aerospace raises $25m Series A for space situational awareness