03 Space systems / Products

Platforms that get
boring
after launch

A bus should be the least remarkable thing on your spacecraft. Ours are built around a single machined core, one power and data backplane, and an interface document that has not changed in three years.

A small satellite with deployed solar arrays undergoing integration
HALYARD-400 FM07Post-integration
19 platforms delivered 7-year design life 2 ISO 8 halls ESA ECSS baseline
The family

Two sizes.
Same rulebook.

Both platforms share avionics, harness architecture, ground support equipment and test procedures. Moving a payload between them is a mechanical job, not a redesign.

Spacecraft units on integration trolleys inside a clean room
HALYARD-200

60 kg class

For technology demonstration and single-instrument missions. Body-mounted arrays as standard, deployable wings optional.

Dry mass28 kg
Payload32 kg · 65 W OAP
Pointing0.05° (3σ)
Delta-v65 m/s
Flown6 units since 2021
A spacecraft being lowered into a large environmental test chamber
HALYARD-400

180 kg class

Our workhorse. Optical and radar payloads, constellation builds, and the occasional one-off that needs a lot of power in a small volume.

Dry mass92 kg
Payload88 kg · 210 W OAP
Pointing0.012° (3σ)
Delta-v210 m/s
Flown13 units since 2022
Subsystems

Sold on their own,
as often as not

Roughly 40 % of our space work is a subsystem going into somebody else's spacecraft. That is fine by us; it keeps the interfaces honest.

Primary structure

Machined 7075 and 6082 cores, CFRP sandwich panels with aluminium honeycomb, titanium fittings where the load path demands it. Typical first mode above 110 Hz.

Mechanisms & deployables

Hold-down and release actuators, hinge-driven arrays, 3.2 m deployable booms and one antenna that unfolds in a sequence we are still slightly proud of.

Harness & integration

Space-grade harness to ECSS-Q-ST-70-08, built by IPC-certified operators. Every conductor ring-out recorded, every crimp micrographed on a sample basis.

Separation systems

15-inch and 24-inch clamp bands with low-shock release, plus a compact pusher for rideshare stacks. Shock response spectrum data published with the datasheet.

Power

Array layout, battery integration and a distribution unit with per-channel latching current limits. We buy cells and MPPT silicon; we build everything around them.

Ground segment interface

S-band and X-band front ends integrated with our own ground station at Machrihanish, so link budgets get proved before the spacecraft ships.

Track record

Nineteen platforms,
four anomalies, one lesson

We publish our platform anomaly record to customers because the alternative is pretending there is not one. Three of the four were resolved on orbit by software. The fourth cost a payload eleven days of downtime and taught us something unpleasant about latch-up margins in a particular regulator.

Ask for the reliability record
  • 2021

    HALYARD-200 first flight

    Two demonstration platforms into a 550 km sun-synchronous orbit. Both still operating, one well past its design life.

  • 2022

    HALYARD-400 qualification and first flight

    Full qualification model taken to failure in the shaker at 1.6 times protoflight. First flight unit shipped eight weeks later.

  • 2024

    First six-unit constellation build

    Six platforms integrated in parallel across two halls, 71 days from first mate to last shipment.

  • 2026

    Electric propulsion variant

    HALYARD-400E with TERN-1.2 and a larger radiator. Structural qualification complete, first flight scheduled for early 2027.

The curve of the Earth seen from orbit at night
Interface control

Send us your payload ICD.
We will send back a fit check.

Start that conversation

Typically five working days for a first-pass accommodation study, including mass, power and field-of-view.