Initiative
Establish a commercial satellite ground station at CfAT Ltd Heath Road property, Alice Springs.
Overview
CfAT Satellite Enterprises Pty Ltd (CfATSE) will build and own a satellite ground-station comprising two 7.3m antennas.
Commercial operation will be licenced to Viasat Inc. The ground station will form part of Viasat's Real Time Earth business, a network of nine ground-stations globally, providing low latency earth observation satellite data.
Benefits
The development highlights the market potential of Central Australia for commercial enterprises of this nature and will deliver significant income to the Centre for Appropriate Technology, providing ongoing jobs for local Indigenous employees, and contracts for local businesses during the $800,000 facility construction phase.
2020 progress update
Construction of the Viasat ground station, Real-Time Earth (RTE) facility is in progress in Alice Springs. Viasat has partnered with the Centre for Appropriate Technology (CfAT) to deliver this project.