Next step for SpaceEdge

The SpaceEdge project is a collaboration with Unibap and AI Sweden, with the purpose to enable anyone to develop their own satellite app and have it tested in-orbit. The project started in April 2022 and is funded by The Swedish National Space Agency.

We meet Dr. Vinutha Magal Shreenath, Senior Data Scientist at AI Sweden. Can you tell us more about AI Sweden’s role in the Swedish society?

-AI Sweden is a National accelerator in Sweden, funded by the Swedish innovation agencyVinnovaand our partners. Our mission is to increase the use of AI, in several areas including the Space sector. Our first project in Space was the Swedish Space Data Lab which is a knowledge and data hub for Swedish stakeholders working with Earth Observation data.

What is the role for AI in the Space market as you see it?

-The Space sector is going through a massive change, with new opportunities for the private sector. I also see that there is a really crucial role for AI in Space. One of the fundamental things about Space is that we rarely get to have people in Space, that is why we need AI in Space to conduct operations among other things.

What is the significance of the SpaceEdge project?

-SpaceEdge is a unique open testbed for space app development with the possibility for developers to upload their apps to SpaceCloud in-orbit. The project is a close collaboration between us and Unibap, where they have been instrumental in guiding us through the possibilities with their hardware and the SpaceCloud software. In the project we have also managed to establish a process how to take an idea from concept to fully realized application in-orbit.

What is the future for the SpaceEdge project?

-It has been funded for another year, the first part of the project was innovation heavy, now it is more about proving the merits of the setup. We have a simulator that allows testing of applications with real life circumstances, covering such things as battery power, storage, communication etc. The project also includes studying the technical possibilities for the next generation of supercomputers in space with the capacity to train new AI abilities in-orbit, without the need for re-training on Earth. To develop this further we need more stakeholders to engage in challenges ahead.

Johan Åman, CEO at Unibap, comments the continued collaboration in SpaceEdge with AI Sweden.

-We are pleased to continue our collaboration with AI Sweden within SpaceEdge Phase 2. This project allows for rapid application development and testing in a testbed, as well as in space, with the same simplicity as regular cloud services. In addition to supporting application developers to use edge technology for on-board data processing, the project also includes assessments of new hardware accelerators for AI/ML, and upcoming CPU/GPU solutions for the next generation computing platform.

Dr. Vinutha Magal Shreenath

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