The companies have an ongoing relationship, and Loft Orbital procured buses from LeoStella in 2020.
Condosat operator Loft Orbital Solutions and LeoStella have extended their production agreement to secure multiple additional LEO-100 buses from LeoStella. These satellite buses are the latest in a series Loft Orbital has secured from LeoStella.
The satellites are based on LeoStellas existing product line of ESPA-class buses. LeoStellas active production line of commercial buses creates an opportunity for customers to acquire high-quality satellites while staying within new-space cost and schedule constraints.
San Francisco-based Loft Orbital is building a small fleet of multipurpose satellites to carry payloads and provide services on behalf of companies that do not want the hassle or expense of buying or flying their own satellites.
Commenting on the deal, Pierre-Damien Vaujour, CEO of Loft Orbital, said: “We chose to procure these additional buses from LeoStella given the excellent performance of its LEO-100 satellite bus, which we used for our YAM-3 mission that launched earlier this year, and YAM-5, which is launching in 2022. Our strategy has been to partner with best-in-class bus providers with significant on-orbit heritage and active production lines. We focus our efforts on the hardware and software products that enable us to treat these buses as payload agnostic platforms, allowing us to fly any payload onboard and provide our customers with a high degree of operational control.”
Brian Rider, Chief Technology Officer at LeoStella, added: “Our COTS buses provide industry-leading data quality, throughput, and up-time as demonstrated on-orbit across multiple operational constellations. LeoStella has a continuous production line of satellites that we can repurpose for a wide range of missions. This approach aligns well with Loft Orbital’s focus on offering its customers fast and reliable access to space. We are excited to be part of that ecosystem.”
