Chinese Commercial Space Company Launches Satellite with Flexible Solar Wing

The satellite, developed by the Chinese commercial space company, GalaxySpace, is the first of its kind in the country equipped with a flexible solar wing whose single-layer flexible solar panel is only approximately 1 mm in thickness. When folded in the rocket, the wing's main body is less than 5 cm in thickness, while it is about 9 meters long and over 2.5 meters wide when working in orbit, Xinhua reported.

Featuring small size, light weight and modularization, the flexible solar wing is capable of absorbing more solar energy and suitable for large-scale stackable satellite launches, which is of great significance for accelerating the construction of a satellite internet constellation.

The satellite is equipped with a millimeter-wave multi-beam digital payload with a capacity of tens of gigabits per second, which is used to verify next generation low-orbit broadband satellite communications, ultra-large energy systems, active thermal control, integrated die-casting structures, stackable multi-satellite release and other technologies.

The satellite will mainly serve to provide low-orbit broadband communications. The digital payload of the satellite is an intelligent "brain" installed on the satellite, enabling the satellite to flexibly allocate its communications resources, and automatically perform operations and beam allocation according to business requirements.

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