SSTL’s international exports recognised with a UK Board of Trade Award

The award was presented to SSTL’s Managing Director, Sarah Parker by the UK’s Secretary of State The Rt Hon Dr Liam Fox MP at the first international Board of Trade Awards ceremony held on board HMS Queen Elizabeth in New York on 22 October 2018 and hosted by Admiral Sir Philip Jones KCB ADC, First Sea Lord and Chief of Naval Staff.

Presenting the Award, International Trade Secretary, Dr Liam Fox, said: “As a global leader in the small satellite field, SSTL is a fantastic advocate for international trade. Accountable for 40 percent of the global small satellite export market, the company is a fantastic example of British expertise leading the way in space technology.

“I am delighted that my international economic department is presenting SSTL with a Board of Trade Award, paying testament to its continued export growth and innovation.”

On receiving the Award, Sarah Parker said “I am delighted to accept this award in recognition of SSTL’s impressive international exports figures – a testament to the space engineering expertise, innovative flair, and collaborative spirit of our employees.”

Since the Company was founded in 1985, SSTL has grown from 4 to 500 employees and now has 40% of the world’s small satellite export market, with an annual turnover of £100m. With the launch of 7 satellites this year alone, SSTL has now launched 57 satellites on 34 launches from 8 launch sites around the world and has also provided 18 space development and training programmes for international customers, including the US, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Chile, Thailand and South Korea.

SSTL specialises in the design, manufacture and operation in orbit of small satellites, with full capability through the design, build, test, launch & operate phases of a mission. Customers include commercial organisations, space agencies, national governments, academia and research institutions and SSTL’s spacecraft are used for Earth observation and science, navigation, telecommunications, exploration, and technology demonstration in Low Earth Orbit, Medium Earth Orbit, Geostationary orbit, and beyond Earth’s orbit.

SSTL is a pioneering and innovative company acclaimed for starting the small satellite revolution back in the Eighties and has achieved an impressive number of “Firsts” in the field of small satellite engineering including launching the first satellite to have a web address in orbit (UoSAT-12, 2001), designing and manufacturing the first satellite in Europe’s Galileo satellite navigation programme (GIOVE-A, 2005) and most recently designing, manufacturing and operating the first satellite to demonstrate space debris removal technologies in orbit (RemoveDEBRIS, 2018).

SSTL’s current order book includes navigation payloads for Europe’s Galileo satellite navigation constellation, 6 satellite platforms for the FORMOSAT-7 weather forecasting constellation, remote sensing satellites for UrtheCast’s UrtheDaily constellation, a small geostationary platform for the Eutelsat Quantum telecommunications satellite, a 12U nanosatellite for Honeywell to test a new two-way VHF Data Exchange System (VDES) payload for the exactEarth advanced maritime satellite constellation, a target satellite for ASTROSCALE’s ELSA-d mission which will simulate capture of orbital debris and validate end-of-life spacecraft retrieval services, and an Earth observation satellite for Kazakhstan.