In late February, Space One Co Ltd plans what is being billed as Japan’s first private sector satellite launch.
The launch, which was originally scheduled to take place in March 2022, has been postponed twice, with one delay blamed on Covid and another less plausibly on the war in Ukraine. Will the third try be a charm?
Space One’s satellite will be carried into space on a Kairos solid fuel rocket launched from Space Port Kii. Built by Japanese general contractor Shimizu Corporation, Space Port Kii is located near the southern tip of the Kii Peninsula in Wakayama prefecture south of Nagoya and Osaka.
The type of satellite and its mission have not been disclosed.
The Kairos rocket is based on technology developed by IHI Aerospace and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). It is a relatively small rocket at 18 meters long and 1.4 meters in diameter, but is capable of putting satellites weighing up to 100 kilograms into low earth orbit at an altitude of 500 kilometers.
By comparison, Japan’s primary large-scale launch vehicle, the liquid fuel H-IIA developed by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and JAXA, is 53 meters long and 4 meters in diameter.
Kairos is the ancient Greek god of time and opportunity. According to a Space One press release, Kairos also stands for Kii-based Advanced & Instant Rocket System.
Management hopes that its solid fuel technology will enable Space One to provide the world’s shortest time from order to launch – only four days, compared with more than a month for liquid fuel rockets.
“SPACE ONE is a launch service that uses small rockets. We will offer the world’s shortest lead time from contractual agreement to launch as well as the world’s most frequent launching schedule,” the press release says.
Headquartered in Tokyo, Space One is owned by Canon Electronics, IHI Aerospace, Shimizu, the Development Bank of Japan and Kiyo Bank, a regional bank headquartered in Wakayama city.
The company aims to establish a low-cost, quick-response commercial launch service for small satellites, targeting 20 launches per year by mid-decade.
Canon Electronics came up with the original Space One concept and is the company’s largest investor with a 44% share. Space One was established in 2017 under the name New Generation Small Rocket Development Planning, but dispensed with that unwieldy name the following year.
Just as Japan’s ispace, inc, should not be confused with China’s iSpace, do not confuse Japan’s Space One with China’s OneSpace.
Established in 2015, OneSpace (Zero One Space Technology in literal translation from Chinese) also launches small satellites. Its OS-M2 combination solid and liquid fuel rocket is 20 meters long and 1.4 meters in diameter. It can put a payload weighing up to 300 kilograms into orbit at an altitude of 500 kilometers.
So who is copying whom? Neither name is particularly original. There is another Space One in Japan, a company based in Fukushima that has built a post-nuclear disaster business encompassing e-commerce, website development and commercial drone aircraft.
Its website address is spacexone.com while the satellite launch company’s is space-one.co.jp.
Elsewhere around the world, there are companies known as Space One involved in areas as diverse as retailing, job search, auto sales and architecture, not to mention the SpaceOne fusion dance club in Singapore.
Is it an accident that the Space One Kairos and OneSpace OS-M2 rockets are about the same size and are designed to put satellites into similar orbits?
If Space One can achieve its goal of 20 launches per year, then it will have apparently worked out all of Kairos’ bugs and have a highly reliable launch vehicle that can serve numerous applications including telecommunications, observation and sensing, scientific analysis, traffic pattern analysis, vehicle identification, navigation and mapping.
The plans of JSAT and other Japanese satellite operators indicate a domestic market potential considerably greater than Space One’s targeted launch capability.
Japan’s other privately-owned small space launch company, the pretentiously-named Interstellar Technologies, has yet to put a satellite into orbit.
Space One’s corporate investors
Canon Electronics is a consolidated subsidiary of Japanese camera and copier maker Canon Inc. Its products include scanners, printers and related software, camera parts, a milling machining center used in dentistry; and small satellites weighing less than 100 kilograms equipped with still and video cameras, telescopes and sensors, satellite components, and satellite imagery, video and analytics.
The company’s satellite technology is focused on high-resolution earth observation for use in agriculture, geology, logistics, traffic analysis and other commercial applications. It entered the space industry in 2009.
IHI Aerospace is a wholly-owned subsidiary of IHI (formerly Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries), one of Japan’s top engineering and industrial machinery companies. It designs and manufactures rockets, space capsules and other equipment for Japan’s space program, rocket launching systems, rocket motors for guided missiles and drones for the Japanese military, jet engine parts and other aerospace products.
The Kairos rocket is based on technology developed by IHI Aerospace and JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) for the Epsilon launch vehicle manufactured by IHI Aerospace. The Epsilon rocket, which is 27 meters long and 2.6 meters in diameter, is primarily used to launch scientific satellites.
Shimizu Corporation is one of Japan’s top general construction contracting and civil engineering companies. Its investment in Space One and construction of the Kii Space Port is an initial manifestation of its interest in extraterrestrial building projects. It also has plans for a space hotel, solar power generation on the moon and a permanent moon base.
The Space Hotel design has four sections: a guest room module with 104 rooms (64 guest rooms), artificial gravity generated by rotation, public spaces, viewing platform and energy supply.
The Luna Ring project aims to install a ring of solar power cells around the equator of the moon, convert the power into microwave laser beams and transmit the energy to earth.
The Lunar Base project is intended to be an important part of Japan’s future space development plans, including:
“Inflatable and module-type structures that are relatively easy to assemble will initially be used, and there will subsequently be a gradual transition to structures that make use of the moon’s resources. This is because many construction materials are bulky and heavy, and it would not be very realistic to transport them from earth to the moon.”
Shimizu is researching civil engineering, construction, transport and installation procedures, materials and structures required for habitation, scientific research, resource extraction, tourism and other activities on the moon.
Shimizu will have competition. In November 2022, NASA awarded a US$57.2 million contract to ICON, a construction company headquartered in Austin, Texas, to support its “Project Olympus,” which aims to build permanent structures on the moon using local materials.
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