At Press Time: Smaller Is Better

Satellite News has learned that Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.) is calling on the U.S. government to shift its focus from large satellites that have lots of technology packed onto them to smaller ones.

Allard said that a by-product of spending money on fewer satellites has caused too much technology to be built into the satellites, leaving the government exposed financially and otherwise to a launch or satellite failure. Additionally, he noted that by packing fewer satellites with more technology, the projects continue to increase in their complexity and that, too, drives up costs, causing projects to overrun their budgets and fail.

To counter this, Allard is calling on the government to place an emphasis on smaller, simpler satellites to reduce not only costs, but the construction and launch times as well. Satellite News will continue to monitor this situation.