Thales Selects U.K. Imagery Firm to Build ESA CMOS Sensor
By Jeffrey Hill | December 12, 2011
[Satellite TODAY 12-12-11] U.K. imagery technology supplier E2V has signed a multi-million Euro agreement with prime contractor Thales Alenia Space to design and manufacture a space qualified CMOS imaging sensor, E2V announced Dec. 9.
The sensor will be used in the Flexible Combined Imager (FCI) instrument of the Meteosat Third Generation (MTG) cooperative project between The European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) program.
E2V will manage the sensors’ supply chain from in-house design to qualification and delivery of the sub-assembly, including the CMOS imaging sensor itself and other customized hardware.
“The FCI instrument onboard each of the MTG satellites will provide images of our weather systems and environmental changes with better spatial, temporal and radiometric resolution than currently available,” E2V said in a company statement.
The first MTG-I satellite is scheduled for launch in 2017, with the first MTG-S spacecraft set for orbit in early 2019.