COM DEV International Inc. has been awarded a $8.6-million contract from the Canadian government to design, build and launch a micro-satellite. The Cambridge ON company only recently announced its new initiative to build a new micro-satellite platform that can be used in a whole host of communications and monitoring applications.

The satellite program, dubbed Maritime Monitoring and Messaging Micro-satellite (M3MSat), is a technology demonstration mission funded and managed by Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). There will be two payloads on the micro-satellite: one to support maritime shipping navigation and another for civil communications.

M3MSat will demonstrate spaced-based Automatic Identification System (AIS) technology developed by COM DEV. Traditionally, AIS signals broadcast from the world's major marine vessels for navigation and identification purposes are collected by other ships and land-based receivers within a 50 nautical mile range. Collection of the signals from space using COM DEV's unique AIS technology would enable an unprecedented global view of the world's shipping traffic.

“We believe micro-satellites will prove to be a very useful platform for meeting some of the fundamental national priorities of a country like Canada, where geography dictates that many applications are more effectively undertaken from space than they can be from the ground,” said John Keating, COM DEV’s CEO.