Earth observation

The Government of India headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has approved the agreement on cooperation in space research for peaceful purposes with Uzbekistan, according to a Trend News Agency report citing local Uzbek media.

Azerbaijan’s state space corporation, Azercosmos, will examine the economic and commercial feasibility of building additional Earth observation satellites in its approved 2019-2022 state programme for remote sensing, according to a report by the Trend News Agency.

Australia’s national science agency, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), has announced that it would be extending its Earth observation capabilities by acquiring Australia’s first CubeSat designed to detect invisible infrared light.

India and Japan have scheduled their first annual bilateral space dialogue in March 2019, where they will discuss cooperation and coordination on a range of civil and national security space issues, ranging from space-based maritime domain awareness and satellite reconnaissance through to the harmonization of positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) systems and space exploration, according to a report in the Nikkei Asian Review.

Legislators in the Philippines Congress have passed key legislation that will establish the Philippine Space Agency (PhilSA), placing the organisation in charge of developing, running, and promoting the Southeast Asian country's national space programme.

The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) is making preparations to carry out its Mission 1 (M1) and subsequent Mission 2 (M2) CubeSat and small satellite demonstrations in cooperation with the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Canberra, according to a report in The Australian newspaper.

Japanese New Space Earth observation company Axelspace Corporation has completed a Series B funding round raising approximately 2.58B JPY (U.S.$22.8 million).

Saudi Arabia's Earth observation satellites, SaudiSat-5A and SaudiSat-5B, were successfully launched on board a Long March 2D launch vehicle on Friday, 7 December 2018, from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre (JSLC) in Northwest China at 04:12 UTC.

The UK's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) at Porton Down has issued a tender for the development of a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite reconnaissance system that weighs less than 500 kilograms, with the aim of having an on-orbit demonstrator satellite by 2022 and the start of an operational constellation for the UK's Ministry of Defence by 2025, subject to funding, according to a report in Wired UK.

Azerbaijan and Iran have concluded negotiations on space cooperation, to include the Iranian use of Azerbaijani communications satellites and the joint development of a remote sensing satellite, according Azerbaijani media reports.