Sidus Space Inc (NASDAQ:SIDU) announced it has been awarded a follow-on agreement for the next phase of NASA’s Autonomous Satellite Technology for Resilient Applications (ASTRA) project.
The company said that during this phase of the ASTRA project, it will work with the Autonomous Systems Lab team at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis Mississippi to integrate ASTRA’s autonomous operational on-orbit capabilities on a Sidus-build LizzieSat satellite as organizations transition to the operational phase of the program.
LizzieSat is set to benefit from cutting-edge autonomous operational capabilities that will offer actionable guidance for optimizing its performance, enabling timely maintenance, and more, Sidus said.
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As part of the agreement, Sidus said it will support the development of a NASA Stennis’ communication center, the ASTRA Payload Operations Control Center (POCC) at the south Mississippi Centre.
The SSC ASTRA communications POCC will tightly integrate with the Sidus Mission Operations Center (MOC) in Cape Canaveral during on-orbit operations, it noted.
“We are excited to support the development of the POCC as part of the NASA ASTRA payload mission on LizzieSat,” commented Sidus’ chief mission operations officer John Curry.
“The POCC will monitor and control day-to-day activities between LizzieSat and NASA’s ASTRA payload operations, utilizing proven NASA operations architectures to greatly enhance our mission success and performance.”
Located in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Sidus Space operates from a 35,000-square-foot manufacturing, assembly, integration, and testing facility focused on commercial satellite design, manufacture, launch, and data collection.
The company has a broad range of Space-as-a-Service offerings including space-rated hardware manufacturing, design engineering, satellite manufacturing and platform development, launch and support services, data analytics services and satellite constellation management.
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