Riedel Partners With PTScientists

Riedel Communications has been named as a technology partner for PTScientists, the Berlin-based commercial space company.

Riedel will provide the communications and signal infrastructure for the project 'Mission To The Moon' in which PTScientists will aim to be the first private company to land on the Moon.

Mission to the Moon will attempt to place a spacecraft on the lunar surface, dispatch two remotely controlled Audi lunar quattro Moon rovers, and broadcast live video back to Earth in HD. Due to launch in 2018, the project is the work of PTScientists and their technology partners, Audi and Vodafone.

PTScientists selected the Taurus-Littrow valley for the Mission to the Moon, the landing site of Apollo 17 in 1972. This location will provide an opportunity to see how the objects left behind by Apollo 17 have survived over 45 years on the Moon. After using a commercial SpaceX rocket to reach Earth's orbit, the PTScientists' ALINA spacecraft will travel to lunar orbit, before soft-landing on the Moon and releasing the pair of Moon rovers. ALINA will also be used as an LTE base-station, enabling data connectivity between the two rovers and the lander ALINA, and could also act as a communications base-station for future missions.

As a technology partner, Riedel will provide essential communications via its Artist digital matrix intercoms and Bolero wireless intercoms for Mission Control and all aspects of the live telecast. In addition, Riedel MediorNet systems will be used for all signal distribution and processing on the ground, including the video data collected by the Moon rovers.

Jacqueline Voß, Manager, Corporate Development at Riedel Communications, said: "At Riedel, we're no strangers to performing under pressure, as demonstrated by our work supporting Felix Baumgartner's record-breaking free-fall jump from the stratosphere. After the massive success of the Stratos project, I wondered what would be next. Being a technology partner for the Mission to the Moon is not just a huge testament to the reliability of our Artist and MediorNet solutions, but it also speaks volumes about our engineering teams that work behind the scenes. All of us at Riedel are thrilled to be a part of this project."

"Landing on the Moon is very complex, and it is vital that each person on the mission is working with the latest mission data and has the ability to communicate with the rest of the team without delay," added Robert Böhme, CEO and Founder of PTScientists. "We're pleased to be working with a company that has a long track record of providing services in high-pressure, live broadcast environments. The Riedel team already understands what we mean when we describe things as 'mission critical.'"

Image: ALQ at Apollo 17 Artwork. 
Photo Credit: PTScientists/NASA.

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