Thales Alenia Space Italy was awarded contract prime following an Open Invitation To Tender (ITT) issued by ESA in March, 2009. It will lead a team consisting of top representatives from the aviation world as well as the space industry.
Iris, element 10 of the ARTES Programme, aims to develop a new air-ground communication system for Air Traffic Management. It is the satellite-based solution for the Single European Sky ATM Research (SESAR) programme carried out by the SESAR Joint Undertaking. By 2020, it will contribute to the modernisation of air traffic management by providing digital datalinks to cockpit crews in continental and oceanic airspace.
"We are very happy to have reached this important milestone in the Iris programme," said Mr. Franco Ongaro, head of the ESA Telecom Technologies, Products and Systems Department. "But it is only the beginning. We have to work hard to demonstrate to the main stakeholders that the system will meet their business and safety needs."
The objectives of the ANTARES study include:
- Requirements consolidation of the system, the system elements and the external interfaces to a level enabling the issue of technical specifications for the space and ground segment.
- Design, specification and testing of a communication standard suited for ATM applications up to the level required for standardisation.
- Support the development of the communication standard by means of the development and use of a verification testbed.
- Selection of an operational system architecture as a result of a trade-off between several options
- Preliminary design definition and justification for the operational system and its elements, including the internal and external interfaces.
- Definition of the approach for system verification and validation, and plan in view of a service certification from aviation safety authorities.
- Preliminary design definition and justification of the Pre-Operational System required for System Validation and its elements.
- Design and development of the user terminal up to prototyping and early hardware testing.
- Support ESA in consolidating programmatic aspects, by assessing the impact of requirements and constraints from external entities (operators, institutional entities, airlines, etc,) in terms of associated cost, development and deployment schedule.
"The ANTARES study shall start with a requirements consolidation phase leading to the System Requirement Review in mid-2010," explained Mr. Luca Pighetti, ANTARES Project Manager. "The team will first work collaboratively among the avionics manufacturers, the telecom system designers and the space and ground segment experts in a so-called 'system integrated team'. This system integrated team will define several system options that will be discussed with aviation in order to converge towards a baseline by mid-2010."
Once a baseline is selected, design activities will continue until the Preliminary Design Review which is planned to take place at the end of 2011.
Other companies involved in ANTARES include: Aedel Aerospace, Airtel ATN (IRL), Capgemini Norge (N), Commsonic (GB), Evolving Systems Consulting (CZ), Frequentis (A), Honeywell International (CZ), Indra Espacio (E), Iguassu Software Systems (CZ), IZT (D), Next (I), OHB-System (D), SINTEF ICT (N), Skysoft (P), DLR(D), Space Engineering (I), Syderal (CH), Thales Alenia Space Espana (E), Thales Alenia Space France (F), Thales Avionics (GB), Thales UK (GB), University of Salzburg Scientific Computing (A).
"We are very pleased to start the system design study with such a complete team that includes a wide range of competencies from the aviation world, notably two of the leading world avionics manufacturers, from the telecommunication industry and from the space sector," said Ms. Nathalie Ricard, head of the ESA Iris Programme.
Iris Phase 2.1 was approved at the 2008 ESA Council of Ministers and will lead to a decision point in 2011 for the start of Phase 2.2. Other activities of Phase 2.1, including studies of operation of the satellite system and further technical studies, are foreseen to start in the near future.
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