OpenCosmos’ OpenConstellation to Solve Global Challenges

British startup OpenCosmos announced on 21st September the opening of its OpenConstellation programme. With this programme, OpenCosmos hopes to democratise space-borne data collection.

Open Cosmos provides easy access to crucial data that third-party entities can analyse and use to model actionable solutions to global problems like climate change and natural resource exploitation. In taking a different look at solving global issues, the company seeks to launch the OpenConstellation program – a shared satellite infrastructure that will avail otherwise hard-to-get data to small countries or companies that don’t have the resources to purchase this information.

For a start, a group of space organizations from Europe such as AGAPA, CEiiA, ESSA, UKSA and Satellite Applications Catapult have chipped in to help Open Cosmos launch the first batch of six satellites by November 2022.

OpenConstellation and DataCosmos

Apart from designing and launching the satellites, Open Cosmos will maintain them and handle all the data downlink and processing before passing it on to partners through the DataCosmos sharing platform. DataCosmos is a cloud-based platform that went live earlier in the year and provides access to various types of imagery and data from additional sources, including drones, sensors and algorithms that complement satellite imagery making it more valuable and usable in solving world problems.

The current portion of OpenConstellation comes from Open Cosmos. It uses the company’s multispectral and hyperspectral satellites with a resolution of 5m over a 20km swath or 2.5m resolution and a 13km swath. OpenConstellation plans to launch additional satellites with better spatial and spectral resolutions to cover other bands in the spectrum. The company aims to have at least 25 satellites in orbit to cater for the needs of the market.

Speaking about the venture, Open Cosmos CEO and founder Rafel Jorda Siquier revealed that satellite photography and telemetry could provide sufficient data to devise solutions to existing global problems. OpenConstellation seeks to accelerate this by putting the necessary data in the hands of more researchers and decision-makers. The mutualised infrastructure will ensure more budget organisations and governments can access the data, hence increasing the number of brains working to find solutions to global problems.

Open Cosmos was earlier reported to have signed a contract with ESA to study Earth’s magnetic field and to have built the DOVER satellite which is to be launched from Cornwall Spaceport during Virgin Orbit’s maiden launch from the UK.