TRISAT-R Software Successfully Updated in Orbit

We are pleased to announce that SkyLabs and the University of Maribor have reached another important milestone in space operations by a successful update of the software onboard the TRISAT-R nanosatellite flying in the Middle Earth Orbit (MEO).

The nanosatellite TRISAT-R flying in the MEO at altitude of approximately 6000 km received its first in-orbit software update of the attitude determination and control algorithm. A coding error on the existing code was identified thus causing improper operation of the spacecraft’s stabilization algorithm. With the successful update of the satellite’s software the unwanted rotation decreased in six hours to less than 1 degree per second, which resulted into a stable two-axis attitude control. After successful in-orbit commissioning of the updated software, the fallback software image was also updated to ensure proper operations in case of a possible onboard non-volatile memory error.

Dr. Iztok Kramberger, Chief Innovation Officer at SkyLabs, elaborates: “The best-in-class products from SkyLabs including end-to-end solutions provide customers the capabilities to perform such challenging tasks like a Firmware upgrade in MEO on a nano scale satellite to safe such an important mission,” and further states: “personally, I also believe that this is the first successful firmware upgrade in MEO at nano scale ever performed.”

With the successful software update of the TRISAT-R nanosatellite in the MEO, another important milestone was achieved not only for Slovenian space exploration, but also at the global level.