Exploiting hosted payload opportunities: Surrey's lessons learned from OTB and other missions

Abstract

In early 2012, Surrey Satellite Technology US LLC (SST-US) published a press release announcing the Orbital Test Bed (OTB) mission [1]. SST-US planned OTB to launch in 2015 to flight test internally developed space technologies and deliberately oversized the platform to accommodate other secondary payloads. The press release was an invitation for external customers, with payloads looking for flight, to register interest and allow SST-US to perform preliminary accommodation feasibility analysis. After initial informal collaboration, a U.S. (United States) government customer, NASA JPL (National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Jet Propulsion Laboratory) quickly identified the potential value of OTB to flight-prove a technology demonstration payload with exciting infusion possibilities for NASA interplanetary missions and USAF (United States Air Force) navigation and timing applications. SST-US was awarded a study contract to support the customer through Preliminary Design Review (PDR) while continuing to move OTB towards spacecraft maturity.This paper describes technical, programmatic, and commercial lessons learned from Surrey's rich hosted payload heritage, illustrated using the most recent mission OTB, that could offer an ideal model to exploit fast turnaround hosted payload opportunities.