Pixxel is a India based
private space technology company, aiming to put a constellation of 30+ hyperspectral
earth observation micro-satellites into a
sun-synchronous orbit in 2020s. It was founded by Awais Ahmed and Kshitij Khandelwal while still studying at
BITS Pilani in 2019. Pixxel was also Asia's only space startup to qualify for the 2019
Techstars Starburst Space
Accelerator in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
.
History
Pixxel's first satellite, Anand, was earlier scheduled to be launched in late 2020 on a Soyuz rocket. It later entered in an agreement with India's state owned
NSIL to use a
PSLV
The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) is an expendable medium-lift launch vehicle designed and operated by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). It was developed to allow India to launch its Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) satellites ...
rocket for launching it in early 2021. Its launch on board the PSLV-C51 was delayed in February 2021 due to technical issues. It is now expected to launch on-board the
PSLV-C54/EOS-06 mission.
The PSLV-C54 was successfully launched on 26 November 2022 at 11:56 IST / 06:12 UTC.
Pixxel launched the first of its three demonstration satellite through a hosted camera payload partnership with the Lithuanian firm,
NanoAvionics on 30 June 2021 in their D2/Altacom-1 satellite on a
SpaceX Falcon-9 rideshare mission, Transporter-2.
Pixxel launched its second satellite, Shakuntala/TD-2 on a
SpaceX Falcon-9 rideshare mission, Transporter-4 on April 1, 2022.
Anand and Shakuntala are a part of the three demonstration satellites that Pixxel planned to launch. It plans to launch the first 6 satellites of its Firefly constellation in 2023 and 12 more by the end of 2024.
Pixxel announced that it will provide the highest resolution commercially available
hyperspectral
Hyperspectral imaging collects and processes information from across the electromagnetic spectrum. The goal of hyperspectral imaging is to obtain the spectrum for each pixel in the image of a scene, with the purpose of finding objects, identifyi ...
images. It raised $2.3 million in March 2021 from Techstars, Omnivore VC and others. This is in addition to the $5 million it raised in August 2020 from
Lightspeed Ventures
Lightspeed Venture Partners is a global venture capital firm focusing on multi-stage investments in the enterprise, consumer, and health sectors. Lightspeed invests in seed, early and growth-stage companies.
The company invests in the U.S. and a ...
and others. Canadian firm Radical Ventures led a $25 million funding round in March 2022. The company has raised total funding of $33 million.
The company claims that its constellation is designed to provide global coverage at a revisit of every 24 hours.
See also
*
List of private spaceflight companies
This article is a list of non-governmental, or privately owned, entities focused on developing and/or offering equipment and services geared towards spaceflight, both robotic and human. The list includes both inactive and active entities.
Comm ...
*
Skyroot Aerospace
*
Satellize
*
Indian Space Research Organisation
*
New Space India Limited
*
Bellatrix Aerospace
References
Space programme of India
Indian private spaceflight companies
2019 establishments in Karnataka
Companies based in Bangalore
Indian companies established in 2019
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