A2100 satellite platform gets major facelift from Lockheed Martin
NewsSeptember 08, 2014
PARIS, France. Lockheed Martin engineers have made two major upgrades to the A2100 satellite family that provide broadband, mobile, and military communications, as well as GPS services to millions of consumers around the globe.
The Lockheed Martin A2100 is undergoing a modernization to cut costs and improve delivery timelines – all while enhancing capability. Two A2100 satellites can now be launched to orbit aboard a single rocket via a side-by-side dual configuration that reduces launch costs without sacrificing payload capability. Users will also be able to modify the A2100’s mission payload over its lifetime, due to a new processor that can be reprogrammed in orbit.
Side-by-side launch accommodates large earth-facing antennas aboard each satellite. This is enabled by flexible solar arrays that reduce mass and cost while enabling a narrower satellite.
The reprogrammable mission processor enables users to modify payload configurations and performance in-orbit, adjust satellite-to-ground communication, and suppress interference. Today, satellites usually amplify incoming signals and route them back to earth. Through reprogrammable technology, signals may be processed and routed to different users and locations. For example, if a thousand mobile calls came into a single satellite, the on-board processor is able to switch those calls to discrete users and locations.
The modernized A2100 also provides flexible electrical power, multiple propulsion options including electric, chemical and hybrid systems, and a variety of advanced payload capabilities. The A2100 is tailored and produced using Lockheed Martin’s digital tapestry, a virtual production process that includes additive manufacturing and is aimed at speeding and streamlining design, production, final assembly, and test.
The Lockheed Martin A2100 has more than 40 satellites currently flying. The A2100 also serves as the common platform for multiple government satellites including the Advanced Extremely High Frequency, Mobile User Objective System, Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite Series-R and GPS III.
