SatNEx Summer School

The SatNEx Summer School 2019 was organised by EnduroSat and the Satellite Network of Experts (SatNEx) in Sofia, Bulgaria during September 23-26.


About the School

The school was intended to give a broad overview of the current state-of-the-art technologies in terms of both traditional and SmallSat communication systems. A main focus was the parallels and contrasts between traditional satellites and small satellites and their possible interoperability with applications such as mesh networks and constellations in the future.

The School is intended for people with a general background in Communication Systems who want to have a broad overview on the modern Satellite Communications technologies and future developments.

The lecturers in the school were leading experts from the SatNEx network, active engineers from the Space Sector and university professors working on one or more of the relevant topics. The backbone of the program was composed of several short courses on both the physical and software sides of the space and ground segment in communications satellites.

Each day had a specific theme and lecturers from both the traditional and SmallSat space sector gave talks complementing each-other. A significant part of the school was also dedicated to practical exercises with communication modules and CubeSat components.

The students

1 Assembled a CubeSat

2 Simulated communication scenarios with real satellite modules

3 Visited EnduroSat’s RF Lab

Speakers

Glyn Thomas is a Senior Expert in flexible, processed and HTS payloads, and is using this capacity to co-ordinate an end to end approach to the design development and specification of end to end future flexible high throughput payloads.

Glyn was deputy chief engineer for Airbus Defense and Space payload equipment’s division during the period 2010 to 2014. He previously managed research and development where he generated a number of key patents in the fields of flexible communications payloads.
He currently has the role of lead engineer for the key Airbus programme: Enhanced Mobile Broadband and Very High throughput Satellites.

Glyn Thomas (Airbus)

Dr. Ing Alberto Ginesi is the Head of the Telecommunication Systems & Techniques Section of the Technical and Quality Management Directorate at the ESA Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC), Noordwijk, The Netherlands. He is responsible for the R&D of satellite telecommunication systems. His main research interests lie in the area of advanced digital communication systems and techniques from theory to HW implementation.

Dr. Ing. Alberto Ginesi (ESA)

Dr. Nader Alagha is the ESA technical lead and coordinator of the Satellite Network of Experts (SatNEx). He has been with the Electrical Engineering Department of the Technical Directorate at European Space Agency Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in The Netherlands since 2006 where he has been the technical lead of several activities related to telecommunication systems, payload and ground segment development for broadband, broadcasting and IoT applications.

Dr. Nader Alagha (ESA)

Prof. Ana Pérez-Neira has been a full professor at Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in the Signal Theory and Communication department since 2006 and was Vice rector of Research (2010-14). She is fellow researcher at Centre Tecnològic de Telecomunicacions de Catalunya, where she is also the Coordinator of the SatCom and Space activities, having lead more than 20 projects. Her research is in signal processing for communications, focused on satellite communications. She has written more than 60 journal papers, 300 conference papers, co-authored 7 books and she holds 8 patents.

Prof. Ana Pérez-Neira (CTTC and UPC)

Aleksandar is an RF engineer at EnduroSat. His main interests are in the field of passive antennas design and active antennas systems.

He received his Masters degree in the field of Telecommunicatons/RF from Technical University Sofia and is currently doing his PhD thesis there.

Alexander Kolev (EnduroSat)

Raycho Raychev is the founder and CEO of EnduroSat. He is also the founder of several educational programs, most notably the Space Challenges Program. His education includes two Master degrees – Space Management from International Space University and Space Studies Program from the same university. He is also a graduate from Singularity University at NASA Ames Research Center in California, US.

Raycho has served two terms as representative of Bulgaria at Space Generation Advisory Council and has major experience in project management and consulting.

Raycho Raychev (EnduroSat)

Ivan is a Communication Systems design engineer at EnduroSat. He has worked on several projects in the company including the cutting edge X-band and S-band transceivers for nanosatellite applications. His previous experience is in RaySat Antenna Systems includes various transceiver from L-band to Ka-band.

He received his Masters degree in the field of Telecommunications from Technical University Sofia and a postgraduate qualification on the topic of Satellite Communications and Phased Array Antenna Systems from the same university and RaySat Antenna Systems.

Ivan Nedelev (EnduroSat)

Giovanni Pandolfi is the co-founder and CTO at Leaf Space. His experience in the technical and administrative, managerial and organizational fields was extremely important to the effective management of several projects. Being also Project Manager for a sounding rocket project, he also has acquired the indispensable knowledge of many technical problems, solved in any context with insight and critical thinking skills.

Srl. Master Degree in Space Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Italy (2014-present).

Giovanni Pandolfi (LeafSpace)

Dr. ing. Marco Lisi retired in 2019 from the European Space Agency, where he worked as Special Advisor in the Navigation Directorate. He was also supporting the Executive Director of the European GNSS Agency (GSA) as Chief Technical Advisor.
He has been working for more than thirty-five years in the aerospace, defense and telecommunications sectors, covering managerial positions in R&D, engineering and programs,both in industry and in institutional organizations.

Dr. ing. Lisi holds five international patents and authored more than two hundred technical papers published in international reviews or conferences. He also contributes to professional magazines with essays on management, social and economic topics.

Dr. Ing Marco Lisi (Independent consultant)

Peter has worked on Satellite Communications in Canada for well over 30 Years. During that time he has been involved in nearly every program where the state of art was moved forward. In the mid-nineties he led studies that eventually resulted in the flight of an advanced Ka Band digital processing payload on the Anik F2 satellite. He also led the team that first developed and promoted the DVB-RCS standard for two-way satellite communications.

Peter was recently presented with the 2014 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) award for achievement in Aerospace Communications, only the second Canadian and the second UK born recipient after Arthur C Clark to be presented with this international award.

Peter Garland