FMCW radar technology in the automotive industry radar market covers 24 GHz and 77 GHz bands with modulated bandwidths of up to 4 GHz, allowing simultaneously ultra-precise determination of target range and its relative velocity. Fine angular resolution with 0.1 deg steps at distance of 300 m and beam-steering capability has been recently demonstrated. FMCW systems have also proved their efficiency for detection of fast-moving objects with small cross-section such as drones.

In December 2019, the 3GPP standardization group approved a dedicated work-item for the implementation of a new set of 5G New Radio (NR) specifications allowing the integration with mobile broadband satellite networks. This is the first time ever that the space industry has this challenging opportunity of a full integration with terrestrial cellular systems, and to benefit from very large economies of scale.

The millimeter wave domain is also known as the extremely high-frequency (EHF) spectrum ranges from 30 to 300 GHz. Early works on atmospheric propagation in EHF evidenced encouraging future usage for satellite communications. The allocated W-band for satellite services (71-76 GHz and 81-86 GHz) seems to provide a favourable attenuation window related to oxygen absorption. The exploitation of W-band may offer many advantages for wireless communications, which make it suitable for satellite links, such as: broad bandwidths for high data rate information transfer (e.g.

Future high frequency interferometric antennas (e.g. at Ka band) using large baselines require verification and testing with a very high accuracy, in particular in phase. While such interferometric testing and ground calibration techniques have been successfully performed in the past (i.e.

Aluminium-based alloys obtained by a rapid solidification process have been successfully used for manufacturing optical mirrors. The maximum size of this type of aluminium mirrors is limited by the size of the billet, i.e. currently considered to be approximately 500 mm with and homogeneous microstructure. Consequently, the current manufacturing processes allow to produce mirrors with an effective area limited to a maximum dimension of 400 mm . The need for larger Aluminium-based mirrors is coming from scientific missions that require a large collecting area.

The Doherty concept has proven to be a very effective technique for designing amplifiers, which maintain a high efficiency over a wide range of operating conditions. This technique is extensively used in terrestrial applications like base stations where power efficiency is getting more and more attention. Power efficiency is also of concern for space and the Doherty concept could certainly help in designing more efficient PAs. Ka-band is now being considered for mobile services that could offer very high capacity as compared to the existing ones at L-band.

Accurate localisation of assets on planetary bodies will be crucial in future exploration missions when it comes to autonomous vehicles navigation and accurate positioning. On Earth, dedicated systems in L-band are typically used for navigation and localisation.