Constraints and guidelines
SPOT 4 system prime contractor
Industrial prime contractors
    Satellite
    Ground segment
    Payload equipment suppliers
    Bus equipment suppliers
    Vegetation equipment suppliers

Contraints and guidelines

The SPOT programme industrial organization seeks to apply certain guidelines while accommodating major constraints, including:

• mission and system innovations in imaging, overall complexity, and the number of passengers and additional payloads,
• new technologies at the very heart of the system, which inevitably means a degree of risk-taking in programme management terms,
• development synergy between the SPOT 4 and Helios programmes,
• major upgrades to various components of the SPOT system calling for particularly strict interface management,
• main mission developed as a cooperation effort by Belgium, France and Sweden,
• Vegetation system developed as a European Union cooperation effort by Belgium, France, Italy and Sweden.

These considerations resulted in the following industrial organization:

CNES is both the contracting principal and the system prime contractor. For SPOT 1, CNES also acted as the satellite prime contractor. Since SPOT 2, Matra Marconi Space has acted as satellite prime contractor and integrator.

The SPOT 4 development effort involved a number of contracts between French space agency CNES and industrial prime contractors for major subassemblies:

• prime contractor for the satellite bus, HRVIR instruments and flight software: Matra Marconi Space,
• prime contractor for the image telemetry package: Alcatel Espace,
• prime contractor for the Vegetation payload: Aerospatiale,
• onboard magnetic recorders: Enertec; solid-state memory: Sextant Avionique/Dassault Électronique; visible and SWIR sensors: Thomson TCS; (all purchased directly by CNES for delivery to Matra Marconi Space, the satellite prime contractor).

SPOT 4 system prime contractor

As the system prime contractor, CNES responsibilities under the SPOT 4 programme include:

• Development of general system design concept.
• Supply of critical technologies.
• Management of satellite and ground segment development under industrial prime contractorships.
• Design of onboard and ground interfaces with passengers supplied by the European Space Agency (Pastel, ESBT) and the Naval Research Laboratory (Poam III).
• Definition of interfaces with commercial operator Spot Image.
• Definition and carrying out of system qualification tests.
• Operation of orbiting satellites (SPOT 1, 2 and 4).
• Development of the Vegetation system under the supervision of a programme steering committee including representatives of the European Union, Belgium, France, Italy and Sweden. The steering committee is assisted by an international users' committee responsible for defining the main mission options until exploitation begins.

CNES also managed the development by industrial firms of the following passengers and products which were then delivered to the satellite prime contractor:

• Magnetic recorders
• Solid-state memory
• Visible and SWIR sensors
• Vegetation payload
• Pastec
• Doris/Diode

Several CNES subsidiaries also played roles in programme development, including:

Industrial prime contractors

Satellite

Ground segments

Payload equipment suppliers

HRVIR instruments