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Com Dev Establishes Subsidiary to Offer Space-Based AIS Services

By Staff Writer | June 12, 2009

[Satellite Today 06-12-09] Com Dev International Ltd. has established a subsidiary company, exactEarth Ltd., that will offer advanced space-based automatic identification system (AIS-S) data services to maritime authorities around the world, Com Dev announced June 10.
    exactEarth will launch its first three AIS microsatellites, which are under construction in Canada and Europe, and will begin providing its exactAIS service within
the year, Com Dev said. exactEarth is deploying the global infrastructure to support
the planned satellites, including Earth stations, a secure data center, an operations center and processing, analysis, archiving and distribution software.
    "We have spent five years developing, testing and validating an advanced AIS-S technology that we believe outperforms any other known system,” Peter Mabson, president of exactEarth, said in a statement. “In the coming months we will begin to roll out our space-based AIS service capability and will continue our discussions with potential customers and regulatory authorities around the world on how this new advanced capability can help meet their needs in the areas of search and rescue,
environmental monitoring, vessel traffic management, and maritime security.”
    exactAIS will require no changes to on-board vessel equipment or
procedures and will provide standard and custom interfaces to their existing AIS displays. More than 70,000 ships worldwide are equipped with Class A AIS transmitters, but the curvature of the Earth limits reception of the signals to approximately 50 nautical miles for terrestrial-based receivers. Collection of the transmissions from space will
increase visibility into the activities of vessels.