Two more SUPERNOVA buses on orbit

Pumpkin Space -- offering a wide range of technologies and buses for small satellite customers -- is pleased to announce the successful launch, deployment and early-stage commissioning of two more SUPERNOVA buses. The U.S. Navy's Naval Information Warfare Command Pacific's (NIWC Pacific) LACE-1 and LACE-2 are 6U-size SUPERNOVA laser communications platforms that use Pumpkin avionics with flight software originally developed at the U.S Naval Research Lab (NRL). LACE-1 and LACE-2 launched from Vandenberg Space Force Base on March 4 and are operated by NIWC Pacific.

"Pumpkin is delighted to see these two SUPERNOVA buses on-orbit and functioning well," said Dr. Andrew E. Kalman, Pumpkin's president & CTO. "An original cooperation between NIWC Pacific (then known as SPAWAR), NRL, the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) and Pumpkin yielded the first SUPERNOVA buses in the 6U format. SUPERNOVA has evolved as a standardized and open bus for U.S. government customers. These buses were some of the first to utilize Pumpkin's 64W "propeller" solar array, BeagleBone-based linux OBC and BM2 intelligent Li-Ion battery."

6U SUPERNOVA bus with 4U of payload volume

Founded in 1994 and providing hardware, software and services for the smallsat community since 2000, Pumpkin provides market-leading solutions for smallsat solar arrays, power systems, batteries, OBCs, communications solutions, software, testing services and complete SUPERNOVA buses. For more information please contact <[email protected]> or see https://www.pumpkinspace.com.