(We originally posted this in 2021. You can read more of our original ideas in our archive. You can order a business plan of this idea here.)
Problem: Satellites today exist in a private network: unless you are a direct owner of the satellite it is extremely difficult to listen in on communications.
Solution: Given the wide availability of hardware, it’s extremely easy to build low-cost satellites that listen in to existing satellite communications. This business would focus on selling this technology broadly and using it to create open-source repositories of live-streamed satellite images and videos.
Some of the use cases for this technology and business include following satellites as they orbit, listening to what satellites are transmitting, and syncing up to satellite communications (i.e. communications from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s weather satellites). This could allow individuals to live-stream high-resolution black and white images of earth and/or listen in on what’s comping from any coordinates in the sky.
This type of technology was recently proven as potentially viably at low costs as reported by Wired on August 4, 2020:
The project, dubbed NyanSat, … is to make low-earth-orbit satellite communication technology much more accessible and swap out the massive, specialized transmitters, antennas, and radio dishes that go into satellite ground stations for open source software and an affordable hardware kit. NyanSat ground stations aren't refined or powerful enough to replace the real deal, but their strength lies in their potential ubiquity. With one of the devices up and running, you can point NyanSat's antenna to specific coordinates in the sky and listen for the radio frequency transmissions coming from a satellite that's out there.
"We designed this as a sneaky sidestep to make something inexpensive enough that everyone can have it," says Ang Cui, CEO of the embedded security firm Red Balloon Security, which designed the NyanSat project in partnership with the Air Force and Defense Digital Service. "The innovation here is we're using a cheap IMU—inertial measurement unit—to orient the antenna without having to use expensive motors and controls. It's the same type of instrument used in drones for orientation and navigation. We want to engage as many people as possible with something hands-on and get them interested in DIY space projects."
The schematics are open source so anyone can make their own, but the team has been selling the boards and other equipment as a kit for $1. The hardware in the kits costs closer to $100…
Globally, the space economy was worth an estimated $345 billion in 2016, one quarter government budgets and three quarters commercial revenue. As reported by Bryce Space and Technology reported in their Global Space Industry Dynamics Research Paper, “close to 50 nations have government space budgets, nine over $1 billon, and nearly 20 under $100 million.” According to this business, the five trends that stand out in today’s space economy are (1) technological advances creating expectations of more cost-effective (and therefore lucrative) space activities; (2) increased private investment by investors who are new to space; (3) a global economy that is increasingly data dependent with diverse effects on space capabilities and markets; (4) increasingly widely-shared vision of space as transformative for humanity; and (5) military/ strategic developments around space as a crowded and valuable high ground. The first two are what this business in particular would tackle.
You can read more about satellites in particular in this report by Bryce Space and Technology or by reading the summary below.
Monetization: Selling this technology or access to the open source network.
Contributed by: Michael Bervell (Billion Dollar Startup Ideas)