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It is known from the 3rd China Commercial Aerospace Forum held on August 30 that the first flight of KZ-11 solid launch vehicle, researched and developed by CASIC, will be made in a manner of “One Vehicle with Multi Satellite Launch”.
It is known that the research and development (R&D) of KZ-11 launch vehicle is in a combined model of “Systematical Aerospace Management + Flexible Private Operation” by bringing in private enterprises for the R&D and manufacturing of the product. So far, the technical scheme of the first flight has been determined and the developing tests of all sub-systems are being pushed ahead intensively.
For KZ-11 launch vehicle, it is adopted the vehicle-mounted mobile launch, which is capable of satisfying the commercialization, high-density and fast-launch requirements of satellite. With a take-off weight of 78t, maximum carrying capacity in near-earth orbit 1500kg, and carrying capacity in sun-synchronous orbit 1000kg/700km, the launch vehicle mainly undertakes the launch of 400km-1500km small satellite and single microsatellite of near-earth orbit and sun-synchronous orbit as well as multi-satellite networking launch tasks.
On April 24 this year, the second “China Space Day”, ExPace Technology (subordinate to CASIC), the first professional rocket company conducting research, development and application according to the business model, signed the contract for four KZ-1A solid launch vehicle launching services. The successive launching of four satellites can be completed within one week and the rapid construction of remote sensing constellation will also be practiced.
KZ-1A is a type of low-cost and highly-reliable general-purpose launch vehicle developed by CASIC. It uses international general interface and provides launching services mainly for 300kg-level low-orbit small satellites, being characterized by low launching cost, high flight reliability, high orbit injection accuracy, short preparation period, and less guarantee conditions. The launch vehicle adopts series layout with three-stage solid power + final stage liquid boost; the whole length is about 20m, the take-off weight is about 30t, the carrying capacity of the sun-synchronous circular orbit is 200kg/700km, and the carrying capacity of the near-earth orbit is 300kg.
On January 9, 2017, KZ-1A launch vehicle developed by CASIC had already achieved “sending three satellites into space through one launch vehicle” and created the “KZ” speed that only 8 and a half months were taken from signing the contract to completing the launching mission, so as to start a new chapter of the development of commercial aerospace industry in China. As early as in the year 2013 and 2014, the predecessor of KZ-1A general solid launch vehicle developed by CASIC, KZ-1 launch vehicle had successfully completed satellite launching mission twice.
“In international commercial launch, the price of launch with small launch vehicle is generally USD 25-40 thousand/kg, while the prices of launching with KZ-1A launch vehicle and KZ-11 launch vehicle are less than USD 20 thousand and USD 10 thousand respectively, which makes its price extremely competitive.” According to the introduction made by responsible person of CASIC, in order to provide faster, better and cheaper “one-stop” customer service for customers of small satellites and microsatellites all over the world, CASIC created the “KZ” mode of commercial aerospace launching service in the Internet era - following the concept of technical innovation, commercial mode innovation and management innovation, focusing on the design of the integration of structure and function, the integration of system and subsystems, and the inter-penetration of hardware and software, widely absorbing social capitals and markets to participate into the whole process from the R&D of launch vehicles to the launching service, and simplifying the circulation links, so as to improve the reliability and the cost performance of the launch vehicles.
In the field of commercial aerospace industry, CASIC focuses on the huge market of the new generation space launching and application and insists on the combination of social resources and the requirements for self-development. It relies on Wuhan National Space Industry Base according to the development mode of “Mobilizing the wits of whole society in the development of overall design institute, overall design department and final assembly plant”, introduces social capitals, explores new approach for the capitalization of research input, and creates new modes for commercial aerospace projects.
On January 10, CASIC, together with Hubei Yangtze River Economic Zone Industry Guide Fund, Wuhan municipal government investment platform and other social capitals, initiated and set up the Yangtze River Aerospace Fund with the total scale of RMB 10 billion. The initial financing capital of RMB 2.58 billion has been fully funded. The Fund will take commercial aerospace, military and civilian integration, mass entrepreneurship and innovation, reform toward mixed system, and merger and acquisition as the main investment directions and carry out investment mainly around Wuhan National Space Industry Base and the Yangtze River Economic Zone.
At the same time of developing launch vehicles and launching services, CASIC insists the main orientation of commercial application, plans the microsatellite R&D field based on the requirements for the development of future industry such as the IoT and big data, and carries out the R&D of low-orbit small satellite communication constellation system (“Xingyun Project” for short). According to the overall planning, the constellation consists of about one hundred of low-orbit satellites and can achieve the seamless obtaining, transmitting and sharing of the information of the IoT all over the world and build the information ecosystem covering services such as cloud computing and big data. The application industries of the project will involve field data acquisition, logistics transportation, safety monitoring, and emergency rescue.
The first technical verification satellite “Xingyun Test 1” developed independently by CASIC for “Xingyun Project” was successfully launched into the orbit with KZ-1A launch vehicle on January 9 this year. The launch of two test satellites will be completed and the trail operation of application service will be carried out in 2018.
Nowadays, the commercial aerospace industry in the whole world is flourishing. According to the Space Report published by the American Space Foundation, the total economic quantity of the space industry of the whole world reached USD 335.3 billion in 2015, with the economic quantity of commercial aerospace industry accounting for 76%. The commercial aerospace industry develops rapidly in the whole world and remarkable commercial progress of space transportation and satellite remote sensing has been made. A batch of representative commercial aerospace companies are springing up, which brings about brand new thinking mode. It can be expected that the commercial aerospace industry will become the new power for the development of the aerospace industry in China in the future and it will also certainly become the important pushing hand for the construction of a major power in space.
In the next few years, CASIC will take the construction of Wuhan National Space Industry Base as an opportunity, focus on the development of leading commercial aerospace industries such as launch vehicles and launching services, satellite platform and load, space information application, aerospace ground equipment and manufacturing, build new launch vehicle R&D and manufacturing platform, microsatellite manufacturing platform, launching service platform, and microsatellite networking and application management service platform, and try its best to construct Expace Technology into a domestic first-class and internationally-renowned professional company providing commercial aerospace launching service.
