Leveraging the Success of the CubeSat Standard to Create a SmallSat Standard for ESPA Spacecraft

Leveraging the Success of the CubeSat Standard to Create a SmallSat Standard for ESPA Spacecraft

Utah State University, Logan, UT

The space industry has found significant utility in short turn-around, small satellite missions. There has also been a significant increase in both rideshare and dedicated launch opportunities for small satellites around the world. Small satellites can be developed in much shorter timelines than the traditional, large spacecraft missions. In order to fully leverage the short-development time of small satellites, a standardized design approach is required. Following the success of the CubeSat Design Specification (CDS), it is clear that a standard set of specifications in a concise document allows developers to design their spacecraft without knowledge of their specific launch opportunity. A publicly available standard provides developers and launch vehicles with a set of common parameters for initial design and analyses. CubeSats have shown that a standardization approach is effective at getting missions to space quickly and inexpensively. As the small satellite industry continues to flourish, adapting to the new paradigm is crucial to widespread success.