Digantara commissions world’s first commercial space surveillance satellite

On Saturday, the Bengaluru-based start-up Digantara announced the commissioning of the world’s inaugural commercial space surveillance satellite, which can track objects as small as 5 centimeters orbiting Earth while it captured images of South America.

On January 14, Digantara launched the SCOT (Space Camera for Object Tracking) space surveillance satellite using SpaceX’s Transporter-12 rocket. The satellite began its operations on Saturday.

“Space has completely exhausted its hiding spots,” the start-up announced in a post on X.

In a statement, the firm reported that the SCOT satellite attained first light on Saturday, capturing its first image while flying over South America—a stunning view of Earth’s edge, showcasing the city of Buenos Aires shining against the planet’s curve.

The satellite is engineered to track and observe objects as tiny as 5 centimetres, featuring a high revisit rate for regular and accurate monitoring of orbital events.

As space grows more crowded, this ability is crucial for reducing collision hazards and supporting sustainable space activities by offering precise and reliable information to satellite operators and regulatory agencies.

SCOT has been placed in a sun-synchronous orbit, enabling it to monitor objects in Low Earth Orbit more effectively than current sensors, which are constrained by their fields of view, atmospheric conditions, and geographical factors.