2024 was another strong year for Calian, Advanced Technologies’ space division. With its elite engineering and manufacturing teams, Calian progressed the evolution of current product lines and developed new turn-key solutions. Calian also asserted its place as an industry leader while furthering its mission to enhance delivery performance for all their satellite customers.
Software Defined
Solutions
The Calian Software Defined Solutions team continued to excel on a variety of customer needs this past year, providing cutting-edge systems for satellite communications and resource management. In 2024, the team delivered multi-orbit communications, resource management and orchestration systems for commercial operation, as well as a network of satellite gateways to provide global IoT service.
One highlight is that the team continued to advance their resource orchestration solutions to empower satellite operators and satellite network operators to fully leverage the potential of next-generation software-defined satellites and emerging multi-orbit solutions.
Calian’s orchestration solutions allow operators to automate the management of payload resources and ensure synchronization with the ground segment infrastructure to maximize efficiency and sellable capacity of the satellite assets, thus ensuring quality of service to end users now and in the future.
Calian also delivered spectrum interference simulation technology for the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) based on their EarthMesh™ platform. This supports the CSA in coordinating frequency for the ongoing shared use of valuable radio frequency (RF) spectrum. The technology also equips the agency with vital insights for better planning and preparation to navigate the challenges presented by heightened spectral congestion.
As orbits become more crowded, EarthMesh will empower space agencies and satellite operators to plan and manage their missions and operations to optimize spectrum and radio resource usage.
Communications Ground
Systems and Services
The Communications Ground Systems and Services team experienced substantial growth this year. The team increased its manpower for system engineering and sales in 2024 by establishing sales partners in various regions (including southeast Asia) and building and delivering innovative solutions to their global customer base.
Calian continued to be sought after for their skills and experience in delivering high-complexity, high-availability and high-capacity Ka-band and V/Q-band gateways. The team also completed multiple Earth station installations in Europe and North America, including the completion of the commercial V/Q ground station network that went operational in late 2023.
Integrating EarthMesh into your solution provides rapid
data and insights into system performance— image of
ulti-orbit projection of a single NADIR beam for
TDRS 3 and 100 Starlink Satellites (8ms per timestep).
In the Earth observation sector, Calian heavily contributed to the CCMEO feed upgrades and new Earth station site development throughout the year, in preparation for three new ground stations to be completed in 2025.
In Calian’s Satellite Operations group, the team worked on R&D initiatives to bring a new AI-enabled spacecraft anomaly assessment tool closer to reality. New concepts to interact with satellites in orbit using augmented/ virtual reality were prototyped and demonstrated at the August 2024 SmallSat Conference in Logan, Utah, sparking the interest of many potential customers and collaborators.
Calian also performed numerous antenna control system and RF equipment upgrades, expanding its capabilities in supporting life-extension of existing Earth station equipment. This included a contract to supply a 4.8 and 6.0 meter Ka-band turn-key antenna system for European MOD.
In addition to delivering 100 sat-nms MNC monitoring and control system licenses for a main satellite operator in Europe, 2024 marked Calian’s first delivery of a sat-nms antenna tracking system for a main satellite operator in the U.S. Additionally, the team supplied several ST Engineering iDirect hubs and remotes to a German governmental customer.
Calian also expanded into the southwest Asian market, delivering multiple high-performance EW antenna pedestals to India. Back in North America, Calian added six, 2m systems to the Owens Valley Array in California, and developed a full, 3-axis, 4 meter Ka-Band system which received full acceptance by SES, resulting in additional orders.
Calian also continued their exciting work with the NASA in 2024, culminating in the planned installation of Calian’s FGO 12 meter VLBI antenna in Brazil in early 2025.
SATCOM
Products
During the last year, the Satellite Communication Products team furthered the evolution of Calian’s extensive line of satellite communication products, with new high-performance products and extensions to existing products.
For instance, interference analysis features, such as carrier-under-carrier, carrier ID, and decode were added to the Decimator D4 Spectrum for standalone monitoring. Additionally, features for data trending and analysis were added to the Illuminator carrier monitoring product for greater data storage capabilities.
Calian’s innovation led to immediate implementation in 2024 for multiple customers. Calian’s on-orbit testing systems were used to test satellites for Inmarsat GX10 and Arabsat BADR-8. Also, development continued in testing satellites in a LEO satellite program using Calian’s on-orbit systems.
However, on-orbit systems were not the only Calian product line to grow this past year. The ongoing evolution of the Mon-A-Co Monitor and Control System with new and updated products (Mon-A-Co Edge and Mon-A-Co Centrol) was key in Calian being selected to develop and deploy the Element Management System for Telesat Lightspeed Network in 2024.
Calian also introduced the Transporter product line of wide-band, RF over IP devices based on the popular DIFI standard. Transporter was used in field trials of the emerging technology in Europe, North America and Asia, and generated initial sales of the product in 2024, sowing the seeds for further growth in 2025.
Teleports
It was a banner year for Calian in providing teleport services as well as operating teleports in Hawaii, Guam and central Canada.
In addition to completing the integration of Hawaii Pacific Teleport into Calian Pacific Teleports, the team received permanent authorization for use of its Molokai Teleport. Calian also completed the installation of 14 antennas for Eutelsat One Web at its Guam Teleport and broke ground on the expansion of their already successful Maui Teleport, servicing multiple LEO operators.
This year, Calian also secured a contract to commence engineering work for another LEO provider, keeping up with this developing and ever-expanding sector. The company’s support of a leading space mobile company has catapulted the customer solution into an industry leader with its seamless connections from almost anywhere in the world.
To 2025
Looking ahead to 2025, Calian will be offering teleport support as a service (TSaaS) and rolling out a support service to tie in with the ITCS division of Calian to customers around the world. 2024 was a busy year for Calian and the company is well positioned for a highly successful 2025.
www.calian.com
Authors
Various authors at Calian contributed to this article including Dan Baril, Senior Vice President, Space; Darren Schlageter, Vice President, Communication Ground Systems; Russ Palmer, Vice President, Software Defined Solutions; Peter Waskowic, Vice President, Satcom Products; Denis Sirois, Director, Satellite Operations and Services; Mohamed Saad, President, Calian Antenna Solutions; Leeana Smith-Ryland, CEO of Calian Pacific Teleports; and Wilfried Megger, Managing Director, SatService, a Calian company.
Calian, Advanced Technologies is a global supplier of highly technical solutions, services and products to the aerospace and defence, satellite, wired and terrestrial wireless, test and measurement, agricultural technology, GNSS technology, composite and nuclear industries. They provide infrastructure for satellite ground systems including antennas, antenna/RF systems, and software defined solutions for controlling and monitoring satellite network resources, equipment and services. Their engineering, nuclear and technical solutions teams are some of the most highly sought experts in their fields.
Advanced Technologies also designs and manufactures Calian and OEM-branded communication products for wired and wireless applications and power management and control products for military vehicle applications. Additionally, they provide third-party build-to-print electronics/electromechanical engineering, manufacturing/test and product lifecycle management services for customers in commercial and defence/security markets. www.calian.com/advanced-technologies/ space-products-and-services.
To contact our Calian experts, email commsystems@calian.com