Western Australia Space: enabled services and data analytics

• LatConnect 60 (LC60) is Australia’s only satellite EO company with direct tasking, collection and downlink of high-resolution EO imagery in real-time. LC60 is focused on providing end to end EO products and services, from developing a constellation of satellites and payloads to collect multispectral EO data, through to analysis and fusing its data with other data types to provide products and insights for customers. LC60 has several partnerships and collaborations across Australia and Asia. The Western Australian Government has also invested in LC60 to advance the State’s EO capabilities.
• Through its Western Australian office, CSIRO, manages Australia’s share in NovaSAR-1, an EO satellite capable of observing through cloud, smoke and at night. Australian researchers and industry can request to task the satellite and access the image archive free of charge via CSIRO’s NovaSAR-1 data hub.
• CSIRO manages a network of ground-based satellite calibration and validation sites across Australia used by international space agencies to ensure the accuracy of data collected by satellites. This includes the Pinnacles Desert site, ~200 km north of Perth. This infrastructure network supports domestic and international operators to calibrate their satellites and verify the data they collect. This is vital to ensuring the accuracy of data collected by satellites.
• Landgate, the Western Australian Land Information Authority, is at the leading-edge of research and development in remote sensing and its applications, providing a full range of remote sensing services: from direct acquisition of satellite data, to processing of data and then delivering that data to government and business via their products and services.
• Omnidea’s partner company GEOSAT, owns and operates two satellites, GEOSAT 1 and GEOSAT 2. Using their high-quality imagery and analytics expertise, GEOSAT is focused on providing insights to help customers across multiple industries make better-informed decisions.
• Other key WA space data analytics and EO organisations include Astron, Fastwave, FrontierSI, Gaia Resources, Geospatial Intelligence, In Situ Marine Optics, Maptaskr, NGIS, QLSpace and Soar.
• UWA has developed world-leading optical satellite communications technology (see above).
• Curtin University’s GNSS Satellite Positioning and Navigation Group develops theory, models, and methods to provide the high accuracy and high-integrity requirements for future GNSSs.

Key Western Australian infrastructure and activities include:                                                                    

• The Perth-based Australian Space Data Analysis Facility (ASDAF) has been established to enhance Australian SMEs and researchers’ ability to use space data, particularly EO data to provide solutions and services to terrestrial industry.
• The Perth-based Pawsey Supercomputing Research Centre (Pawsey) is the lead Tier 1 supercomputing research facility in Australia and hosts the most powerful research supercomputer in the Southern Hemisphere. Pawsey provides a range of supercomputing, data storage and data visualisation services, as well as key expertise, training and support. Pawsey has also installed the world’s first market-ready diamond quantum accelerator (quantum computer) which operates without the requirement of near absolute zero temperature or complex laser systems.
• Perth-based DUG Technology is at the forefront of high-performance computing (HPC) and currently operates the most powerful commercial supercomputer in the Southern Hemisphere. DUG is building the world’s first carbon-free HPC campus powered by renewable energy in Geraldton. The first data hall will have a capacity of 400 petaflops, with plans for expansion to multi-exaflop scale. DUG has established partnerships with Curtin University in the areas of radio astronomy and astrophysics and the development of algorithms that can detect and monitor space junk and satellites in Earth orbit. DUG is also working with LC60 on HPC data analytics solutions for EO data.
• WA Data Science Innovation Hub provides access to specialised data science capabilities in universities and trained graduates, upskilling programs for industry, the translation of data science capabilities from the resources sector to emerging sectors.
• Edith Cowan University (ECU) is a world-leader in cyber security research and cyber security education and is recognised by the Australian Government as an Academic Centre of Cyber Security Excellence. ECU is home to the Centre for Securing Digital Futures, Cyberwest and the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre. ECU also hosts the largest university Security Operations Centre in the Southern Hemisphere that provides students real world training in monitoring, detecting and responding to cyber security threats.
• Curtin University and Australian cyber security company CyberCX have teamed up to build Nebula, a sovereign cloud platform to host sensitive research. Nebula is designed in cooperation with universities, industries and government to make sure their diverse requirements are met.