That headline is quite misleading, as there are several re-configurable "software-defined" satellites active in orbit, each one presenting different degrees of flexibility. Dynamic power and frequency allocation have been used since the first HTS (Viasat-1, Echostar 23...), while dynamic bandwidth allocation is also a standard design in new satellites (Viasat-2, for example).
Furthermore, other satellites such as Hispasat 36W-1 already have direct radiating arrays / phase-arrays (which I am pretty sure is the core technology of EUTELSAT's Quantum). Sure, Quantum might be (one of) the first satellite that makes full use of this technology, but this is the current trend and all the big satellite comms. companies are going to launch a similar satellite in the next 1-2 years (SES-17, SpaceX Starlink, mPower...).
In any case, I believe that the dynamic resource management (DRM) software (which EUTELSAT claims to have developed) will play a crucial role in all these new satellites. Given the payload flexibility, optimally configuring all these degrees of freedom will become a very very challenging task.
We've updated the submitted title (“UK engineers have finished building Quantum, the first software-defined satelite”) to the sub-heading from the article. It's too easy to get things wrong when editorializing! This is one reason the guidelines ask submitters not to do it.
May I suggest leaving the word "Quantum" out of the title completely. IMHO it's rather cheeky (and misleading) for the satellite manufacturers to use that name at all for something that doesn't involve quantum-mechanics-based technology.
And nowhere will you see the capacity of this satellite actually advertised. My guess is it's about 1/4 of viasat-2 or Jupiter 2, which the former is flexible. There is a trade-off between how much flexibility you really need compared to on-board processing. On one extreme you have no idea where your customers are, so you do all processing on-board. This is the quantum model, I think. This comes at a huge hit to capacity.
Initially, in 2015, they were talking about ~6-7 Gbps [1] but my guess is that the current design allows for a little bit more of throughput (8 beams @ 1 GHz/beam (max. BW) x 2 bps/Hz (?) -> 16 Gbps (?)). In any case, I would say this is a technology demonstrator satellite.
I think that their main innovation might be the software to optimally allocate power, bandwidth, spectrum, and pointing and shape of each beam so that throughput/revenue /"quality of service" is maximized, which might be run on the ground and then the "instructions" sent over the TT&C link to the satellite. I doubt that the spacecraft has the autonomy level required to conduct all these tasks onboard.
Configuration sounds like a nightmare but I know little about controlling satellites. Do you think this is Sophistication at the cost of Simplicity? For example, a well-known band satellite system will float in orbit reliably(?) for a long while, but if you have hardware that is trying to sync up to a satellite signal that has since been altered/shifted/changed into a totally different domain/scope, may it not risk us rendering certain hardware useless? Just a wondering.
There are currently no manned vehicles capable of that trip. Probably the closest thing on the horizon is SpaceX’s BFR/Starship, which is proceeding at an amazingly fast pace, but no way is it ready to go in a year.
This article has a lot of incorrect information in it, specifically how it alludes to this being the first of its kind.
"Quantum's coverage, bandwidth, power and frequency can all be altered in orbit."
All of those can be configured on several different modern satellites.
"It will bring unprecedented flexibility to our customers, allowing for in-orbit payload re-configuration and taking customisation to a new level, while also opening the way to a paradigm shift in the manufacture of telecommunications satellites,"
There is nothing this satellite does that's more customizable than others, such as mexsat from 2010:
"The components and technologies that enable software-defined satellites will become more and more the future of our industry,"
There is a trend towards the opposite, since space resources are a precious resource, allocating a substantial portion of the spacecraft for signal processing makes the bandwidth demand gap fall behind faster.
The part of the satellite being "software-defined" is probably the phased-array antennas of the transponder/payload. I think it is unlikely that all the GHz RF processing is realized as SDR. Maybe someone can dig up more information?
> Eutelsat Quantum is fitted with a suite of powerful operational software, which ensures that the payload resources are used as efficiently as possible. The software tool predicts, operates and manages the on-board configuration and reconfiguration of the satellite. [0]
That makes it sounds like any other telco-satellite with beamforming.
Edit: More information from [1]
> Guilleux said the first Quantum satellite will have eight downlink beams that can range from a minimum diameter of 600 kilometers to a maximum of one-third of the Earth’s surface (the larger the beam, the more dispersed the signal power), and eight independent uplink beams. Customers can split any of those eight beams into smaller sub-beams and follow assets such as ships and planes, he said. O’Connor said the satellite will have a total of 3.5 GHz of capacity, from which any individual downlink beam could support up to 1 GHz. The first Eutelsat Quantum will function just in Ku-band, but Guilleux said future iterations could support other frequencies, including both military and civilian Ka-band.
What's the maximum number of beams? 8 beams at 3.5GHz is a very low capacity satellite, especially given that they likely cannot use all 3.5GHz everywhere.
It’s possible it’s the GHz RF. Even for hardware processing, you have to downconvert to something reasonable like a couple hundred MHz before it’s feasible to digitally signal process.
If your software/processor/bus can’t keep up with that data rate, you can always go lower in hardware and still leave enough headroom for software to tune and process.
I haven’t looked into SDR much though it’s in my “someday” list, so I don’t know how much is typically expected to be handled in software. I suppose it varies depending on the spectrum of interest.
My last project, the GHz spectrum was downcoverted in analog to the hundreds of MHz range, and digitally downconverted further with low pass filters and frequency shifting and then piping out over pcie to a ring buffer for software to do the interesting signal processing.
Xilinx has an RF Zynq FPGA in the works, or maybe available now, that has the analog front end conversion capabilities paired with an fpga with an embedded arm[1]. (No affiliation)
It's definitely possible. I'm guessing based on cost/benefit. Here's an SDR R&D board from 2018 for "low bandwidth applications" using Spartan-6 FPGAS, (https://artes.esa.int/projects/spyrus). Unfortunately they don't provide any results from the radiation test campaign (wonder why?)
They can definitely do on-board signal processing once down converted. This will have a substantial hit on total capacity though, which is what matters most. See my other comments.
Btw, you cannot use standard fpgas in space. They are a special kind hardened for radiation and redundancy.
Why not? There are already plenty of SDRs that can operate in the GHz range. Obviously they don't output the raw RF signal directly but no SDR does that.
Serious question, I know, I know, everyone is sick of the word .. I'll not use it! .. but:
How does the UK leaving the EU affect it's ESA membership?
Can the UK continue to use the French territorial launch sites as easily as they do now?
And finally, from the article, "23 of its 38 currently operational spacecraft as having British input". I wonder are they referring the to Isle of Man here? Which has plenty of satellite companies due to, from what I understand, a very favourable tax regime for space companies.
It does not affect the ESA membership, and does not prevent UK companies to launch from French Guyana. However, shipping may become a bit more complex and costly, and procurement will be thougher, especially in the first months.
Readit News
Furthermore, other satellites such as Hispasat 36W-1 already have direct radiating arrays / phase-arrays (which I am pretty sure is the core technology of EUTELSAT's Quantum). Sure, Quantum might be (one of) the first satellite that makes full use of this technology, but this is the current trend and all the big satellite comms. companies are going to launch a similar satellite in the next 1-2 years (SES-17, SpaceX Starlink, mPower...).
In any case, I believe that the dynamic resource management (DRM) software (which EUTELSAT claims to have developed) will play a crucial role in all these new satellites. Given the payload flexibility, optimally configuring all these degrees of freedom will become a very very challenging task.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
May I suggest leaving the word "Quantum" out of the title completely. IMHO it's rather cheeky (and misleading) for the satellite manufacturers to use that name at all for something that doesn't involve quantum-mechanics-based technology.
Deleted Comment
I think that their main innovation might be the software to optimally allocate power, bandwidth, spectrum, and pointing and shape of each beam so that throughput/revenue /"quality of service" is maximized, which might be run on the ground and then the "instructions" sent over the TT&C link to the satellite. I doubt that the spacecraft has the autonomy level required to conduct all these tasks onboard.
[1] https://spacenews.com/eutelsat-esa-taking-a-quantum-leap-tow...
I'm not a 'the Moon landings were faked' person, but how does this reconcile with manned Moon missions?
[Edit]
So I don't have to add another comment:
My first thought was, 'oh shit, how long before someone hacks one of these and repurposes it?'
Deleted Comment
"Bob, the intern fat fingered the port number, how do you feel about a bit of a sight-seeing trip?"
"Quantum's coverage, bandwidth, power and frequency can all be altered in orbit."
All of those can be configured on several different modern satellites.
"It will bring unprecedented flexibility to our customers, allowing for in-orbit payload re-configuration and taking customisation to a new level, while also opening the way to a paradigm shift in the manufacture of telecommunications satellites,"
There is nothing this satellite does that's more customizable than others, such as mexsat from 2010:
https://boeing.mediaroom.com/2010-12-20-Boeing-to-Build-3-Sa...
"The components and technologies that enable software-defined satellites will become more and more the future of our industry,"
There is a trend towards the opposite, since space resources are a precious resource, allocating a substantial portion of the spacecraft for signal processing makes the bandwidth demand gap fall behind faster.
That makes it sounds like any other telco-satellite with beamforming.
Edit: More information from [1]
> Guilleux said the first Quantum satellite will have eight downlink beams that can range from a minimum diameter of 600 kilometers to a maximum of one-third of the Earth’s surface (the larger the beam, the more dispersed the signal power), and eight independent uplink beams. Customers can split any of those eight beams into smaller sub-beams and follow assets such as ships and planes, he said. O’Connor said the satellite will have a total of 3.5 GHz of capacity, from which any individual downlink beam could support up to 1 GHz. The first Eutelsat Quantum will function just in Ku-band, but Guilleux said future iterations could support other frequencies, including both military and civilian Ka-band.
[0] - https://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Telecommunications_Integr...
[1] - https://spacenews.com/eutelsat-adding-two-more-quantum-satel...
If your software/processor/bus can’t keep up with that data rate, you can always go lower in hardware and still leave enough headroom for software to tune and process.
I haven’t looked into SDR much though it’s in my “someday” list, so I don’t know how much is typically expected to be handled in software. I suppose it varies depending on the spectrum of interest.
My last project, the GHz spectrum was downcoverted in analog to the hundreds of MHz range, and digitally downconverted further with low pass filters and frequency shifting and then piping out over pcie to a ring buffer for software to do the interesting signal processing.
Xilinx has an RF Zynq FPGA in the works, or maybe available now, that has the analog front end conversion capabilities paired with an fpga with an embedded arm[1]. (No affiliation)
1. https://www.xilinx.com/products/technology/rfsampling.html
Btw, you cannot use standard fpgas in space. They are a special kind hardened for radiation and redundancy.
How does the UK leaving the EU affect it's ESA membership?
Can the UK continue to use the French territorial launch sites as easily as they do now?
And finally, from the article, "23 of its 38 currently operational spacecraft as having British input". I wonder are they referring the to Isle of Man here? Which has plenty of satellite companies due to, from what I understand, a very favourable tax regime for space companies.