{"id":383815,"date":"2022-06-29T12:49:00","date_gmt":"2022-06-29T10:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/innovationorigins.com\/?p=383815"},"modified":"2022-06-29T12:49:00","modified_gmt":"2022-06-29T10:49:00","slug":"okapi-orbits-geared-to-bring-order-to-spaces-traffic-jams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/en\/okapi-orbits-geared-to-bring-order-to-spaces-traffic-jams\/","title":{"rendered":"Okapi: Orbits geared to bring order to space’s traffic jams"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It\u2019s easy to look towards the sky on a clear night and imagine an infinite and disorganized expanse of galaxies and rock. Putting order to such an unimaginably large space would be a daunting task for anyone, but a small German start-up has set out its mission to do just that.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Okapi: Orbits<\/a> tries to accomplish the unimaginable by extending networks of data available on Earth to map out all traffic floating far above our heads. Geared towards a range of different space-focused customers, the software it has developed brings together open-source and private data to allow precise tracking of satellites, sensors, and other objects flying around above us.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The beginning of a start-up<\/h2><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The company\u2019s chief executive Kristina Nikolaus opened up about Okapi: Orbits\u2019 story in a conversation that, much like space, spanned the past, present, and future. It\u2019s a very typical beginning for a start-up, she explains over our Zoom call, saying that the company was co-founded by her colleagues who were PhD students at the time.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their interest culminated in a single challenge: how to fuse observational data made up of varying data sources, often incompatible and tailored to different purposes, and accurate climate forecasting to better anticipate the movements that might occur in space.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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With her academic background in management and computer science, shaped through roles at Mercedes-Benz and Siemens, the business instincts come quickly to Nikolaus. \u201cWhen the four of us started off properly, we thought about how to commercialize all this,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A challenge built up over time<\/h2><\/div>\n\n\n\n

But where is this market that stimulated Kristina and her team\u2019s interest? A by-product of the space exploration boom that began at the midway mark of the 20th Century has been the accumulation of space debris from various objects. Estimations by the European Space Agency (ESA) suggest that around 12 accidental fragmentations \u2013 events in which debris is created in space either due to collisions, explosions, electrical problems, or even just detachments \u2013 have occurred over the last two decades.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A prominent incident Nikolaus points to is the 2009 collision between two communication satellites \u2013 the Iridium 33 and the Kosmos 2251 \u2013 which marked the first time a hypervelocity collision occurred between two satellites. Citing this incident, she emphasizes the costly nature of accidents.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nikolaus says: \u201cIn most cases, the satellite is gone forever. In terms of actual monetary amounts lost, it can depend how much the satellites cost. I think the cheapest are around 200K \u2013 for the really small ones \u2013 and the standard ones are between 2-10 million.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, she adds that \u201cthe bigger they [satellites] get the less crucial is the impact. In most cases they have more shielding, for example, the weather and the TV satellites are bigger than observation satellites.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut what is often not considered is the launch cost, which is also a really high price fluctuation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turning back to the 2009 collision, she says that much of the stray debris still floating around in space comes from this incident, underlining the lasting consequences. <\/p>\n\n\n

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A product with several purposes in mind<\/h2><\/div>\n\n\n\n

With more than 50 customers already using the software, Okapi: Orbits\u2019 space management software is aimed at helping satellites reduce maneuvers, limiting downtime, and saving fuel. Whatever the asset is used for high above, their tool is meant to aid the longevity of human-made objects high above.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company relies on a partner network to find its data, including telescopic data, laser-ranging data, and orbit tracking data. \u201cWe’re putting information together and extracting a holistic overview, and this is the basis of our services which help satellite operators, micro launchers, or sensor operators to help calibrate their operations.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More data, more responsibility<\/h2><\/div>\n\n\n\n

When dealing with so much data, it\u2019s natural to begin asking about data security. Nikolaus confirms that this is a priority area for Okapi: Orbits, rooted heavily in the verification of information. \u201cThis is a key thing we’re working on really closely. What we do is double-check, we check with our suppliers, we check the data for validities with our own trackings\u201d, she says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAttacks could happen everywhere and especially in space as it becomes more political,\u201d she clarifies before confirming, \u201cThis is of course an industry of big interest.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking to the future<\/h2><\/div>\n\n\n\n

As their product gains greater popularity, Okapi: Orbits has its eye on, beyond rudimentary expansion, understanding more about space traffic management. Nikolaus explains that full coordination capabilities are being expanded for data suppliers to ensure that strict guidelines on tracking can be complied with in space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The protection of incredibly valuable space assets appears as an industry on the march, and for her, there is no shortage of target markets on the horizon. \u201cWe’re very focused on Europe, but we’re looking towards the US and emerging markets. The Middle East is interesting. All the emerging spaces that are politically stable enough and easy enough to trade to deliver services to,\u201d Nikolaus says.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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Just a few years ago, drone developers found themselves in a modern version of the Wild West, as no clear guidelines or regulations were in … Continued<\/a><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s easy to look towards the sky on a clear night and imagine an infinite and disorganized expanse of galaxies and rock. Putting order to such an unimaginably large space would be a daunting task for anyone, but a small German start-up has set out its mission to do just that.\u00a0 Okapi: Orbits tries to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2497,"featured_media":512132,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8553],"tags":[8192,40622,6158],"location":[24456],"article_type":[6758],"serie":[],"archives":[],"internal_archives":[],"reboot-archive":[],"class_list":["post-383815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-digital","tag-data-en","tag-satellites","tag-space","location-germany","article_type-interview"],"blocksy_meta":[],"acf":{"subtitle":"The German start-up has a huge challenge: how to fuse observational data made up of varying data sources and accurate climate forecasting to better anticipate the movements that can occur in space.","text_display_homepage":false},"author_meta":{"display_name":"Pierre Felcenloben","author_link":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/author\/p-felcenlobeninnovationorigins-com\/"},"featured_img":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/spacex-VBNb52J8Trk-unsplash-scaled.jpg","coauthors":[],"tax_additional":{"categories":{"linked":["Digital<\/a>"],"unlinked":["Digital<\/span>"]},"tags":{"linked":["data<\/a>","satellites<\/a>","space<\/a>"],"unlinked":["data<\/span>","satellites<\/span>","space<\/span>"]}},"comment_count":"0","relative_dates":{"created":"Posted 4 years ago","modified":"Updated 4 years ago"},"absolute_dates":{"created":"Posted on June 29, 2022","modified":"Updated on June 29, 2022"},"absolute_dates_time":{"created":"Posted on June 29, 2022 12:49 pm","modified":"Updated on June 29, 2022 12:49 pm"},"featured_img_caption":"","series_order":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2497"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=383815"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383815\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/512132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=383815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=383815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=383815"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=383815"},{"taxonomy":"article_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article_type?post=383815"},{"taxonomy":"serie","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/serie?post=383815"},{"taxonomy":"archives","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/archives?post=383815"},{"taxonomy":"internal_archives","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/internal_archives?post=383815"},{"taxonomy":"reboot-archive","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/reboot-archive?post=383815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}