IQSat: Aitech’s AI-Enabled Picosatellite for Earth Observation and Imaging Applications

June 1, 2025

Aitech introduced its new artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled picosatellite constellation platform, IQSat, at the 40th annual Space Symposium in April. The platform is designed to bring ready to use commercial off the shelf (COTS) embedded computing to data heavy earth imaging and pattern recognition applications enabled by AI and machine learning (ML) processing and algorithms performed onboard a constellation of IQSats.

Available as an individual platform or in constellations that could include thousands of picosatellites, IQSat will become available to customers in the fourth quarter of 2025.

A unique capability of IQSat is how it leverages a software developed by Pennsylvania-based data analytics provider Intuidex called “Watchman for Space.” Intuidex describes Watchman for Space as a “space data as a service” application that uses “High-Order Low-Resource Learning (HO-LRL) algorithms to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and space-do-main awareness via pattern of life and anomaly detection.”

The image of IQSat released by Aitech upon the introduction of the new picosatellite platform at the Space Symposium in April. (Image: Aitech Systems)

Intuidex’s pattern of life and anomaly detection algorithms — when featured within a fleet of picosatellites, such as IQSat — can give users both real time situational awareness or early warning and detection surveillance. Aitech further notes that the Watchman for Space Software Supports “rapid do-it-yourself user-based modeling, detection and tracking.” Working with Aitech, picosatellite customers can use Watchman for Space to determine what type of surveillance or detection their IQSat fleet will be performing. Those parameters can be adjusted while the fleet is in-orbit, according to Intuidex’s website.

Intuidex also has previous experience providing this capability for picosatellites. In a January 2022 press release, the company describes the use of Watchman by a small satellite startup based in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Quub. The startup featured Watchman on its own low-cost picosatellite that saw its first launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 Transporter 3 mission from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida on Jan. 13, 2022.

A closer look at the fully integrated IQSat picosatellite constellation platform, with solar arrays attached. (Image: Aitech Systems)

“Our technology processes and fuses multiple-source sensor data and quickly identifies objects and events with high accuracy, even in situations where limited data is available for making decisions,” Intuidex notes in the Quub launch press release. “This is all edge-based processing on-board the picosats, meaning the object and event detection, fusion and alerting is performed entirely onboard the picosat in milliseconds, resulting in actionable alerts in down-linked systems in near-real-time.”

In launching their new IQSat platform, Aitech is leveraging its multi-decade track record of supplying embedded computing modules and avionics systems to a wide variety of satellites and spacecraft. Their history of supplying embedded computing for spacecraft includes the following selection from a list provided by Aitech:

Orbital Express: In July 2007, two Orbital Express satellites, were launched and then operated as a demonstration by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to evaluate the feasibility of on-orbit satellite servicing. Aitech provided the avionics and robotics controls for the satellites.
Cassiope Satellite: In September 2013, the first Cassiope satellite was launched and operated by NASA as a “digital courier service” to provide large scale data transfers to remote commercial and military clients. Aitech provided the Command and Data Handling (C&DH) processor for the satellite.
VSS Unity: In December 2018, Virgin Galactic performed the first suborbital space flight of its VSS Unity space plane. Aitech supplied the rocket motor controller.
IM-2 Lunar Lander: On Feb. 27, 2025, Intuitive Machines confirmed the successful launch and commission into space of its IM-2 lunar lander spacecraft on its mission to the Moon. Aitech provided the IM-2’s space-rated single board computer, radiation tolerant communications PMC board, and a rugged space-rated SpaceWire card. The company also provided the complete conduction-cooled hardware for the Nova-C avionics system for use as both a payload controller and image data processor on the IM-2.

These are examples from four space missions that Aitech provided embedded computing for, from a list of more than 20 satellite and spacecraft launches and operations dating back to 1997. Based on their experience providing these space-ready embedded computing building blocks for satellites and spacecraft, IQSat integrates those building blocks into one COTS-constructed flight-ready platform.

In February, NASA published the 461-page “Small Spacecraft Technology State of The Art 2024” report. The report is updated annually to analyze new information about “state-of-the-art” small spacecraft systems and design considerations for identifying components and available technologies that could help develop new satellites and spacecraft. Within the report, NASA features an overview of categorizations of small satellites and the status of small satellite and spacecraft avionics that helps provide more understanding of why IQSat is an innovative new approach to picosatellites.

NASA defines picosatellites as one of three small satellite categories — the other two being microsatellites and nano satellites. Picosatellites, according to the report, have a mass of 1 - 0.01 kg. “Since 2023 there has been an influx of constellations of mini-class small spacecraft with a mass of 201 – 600 kg, as well as a new generation of larger small spacecraft constellations weighing 600 – 1,200 kg,” the report says.

NASA’s report also explains how small spacecraft avionics mainly consist of the following four components: Command and Data Handling (C&DH) computer, flight software (FSW), payload and subsystem avionics.

“The C&DH and FSW are the brain and nervous system of the integrated avionics system, and generally provide command, control, communication, and data management interfaces with all other subsystems in some manner, whether in a direct point-to-point, distributed, integrated, or hybrid computing mode,” the report says.

There is also an interesting excerpt from NASA’s report that explains the type of COTS-based spacecraft embedded computing trend that can be observed in platforms like IQSat. The report notes increasing demand for commercial, military and research missions that fly “data-heavy payloads” and a “new interest in advanced onboard processing for mission data.”

“Next-generation SSA/PSA distributed avionics applications are integrating FPGA-based software-defined radios (SDR) on small spacecraft. A SDR can transmit and receive in widely different radio protocols based on a modifiable, reconfigurable architecture, and is a flexible technology that can enable the design of an adaptive communications system,” NASA’s report says. “This can increase data throughput and enable software updates on-orbit, also known as reprogrammability. Additional FPGA-based functional elements include imagers, artificial intelligence and machine learning processors, and subsystem-integrated edge and cloud processors.”

IQSat’s COTS-Based Design

During an interview with Aerospace & Defense Technology ahead of the launch of IQSat, Pratish Shah, Aitech’s U.S. General Manager, explained how IQSat has flexible payload options that consume up to 30 watts of continuous power in sunlight. Each IQSat has an operational life of up to three years. The picosatellite constellation platform is radiation tolerant for Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and Near Earth Orbit (NEO) operations, and has communications options that include S-Band, JADC2, and ISL/STG.

“Space-based infrastructure solves big problems and fuels big advancements on Earth. The new IQSat platform is integral to space accessibility by delivering low cost, rapid deployment constellations that provide access to actionable information quickly and frequently for infinite applications,” Shah said. “Whether used for military and defense, environmental or agricultural applications, communications or scientific research, the flexibility, cost and availability of a solution like IQSat has not existed before – providing more accessibility to the power of space.”

Shah also explained how the cost of down-linking data from satellites today can be prohibitively expensive for commercial organizations, research firms and government agencies. Instead of sending raw data from space like most satellites do today, IQSat’s onboard AI and ML processing and algorithms can be programmed to downlink only the information or data needed by the end user.

A different image of IQSat provided by Aitech within the new product brochure for the new picosatellite constellation platform. (Image: Aitech Systems)

As Aitech notes in its press release launching the new platform, “IQSat offers the industry’s first common pay-load interface designed to host multiple payloads on a single flexible electrical and mechanical interface, allowing for quick and standardized designs to reduce cost, NRE and time to launch.”

A PowerPoint presentation explaining IQSat’s architecture depicts the picosatellite platform’s design featuring a small rectangular structure that contains three separate modules. These modules include a small propulsion and attitude control module on one end. That module is connected to a slightly larger avionics module that contains the AI-enabled flight processor, communications, electrical power system and a standardized mechanical and electrical ICD/bus. The third smaller module connected to the avionics module on the other end is the payload module where cameras, sensors and other devices can be customized by end users. Aitech describes this payload module as the “functional end that enables limitless applications.”

A 13-second animation of IQSat’s assembly created by Aitech shows a small rectangular structure effectively serving as the chassis or enclosure for the three modules, where small embedded computing components such as printed circuit boards, memory and processing are stacked and aligned with the payload module at the front-facing end of the picosatellite. Each fully integrated IQSat also includes a solar array, antenna and wiring. Aitech has a fully functional prototype being tested and evaluated at their headquarters in California that shows how the onboard AI and ML processing is enabled.

“We want to provide customers for earth observation, pattern recognition and other space-based applications access to COTS-based AI processing occurring onboard the picosatellite,” Shah said. “IQSat provides this COTS approach for customers, without requiring the need for a deep knowledge of satellites or operating in space, because the platform has already taken care of that.”

This article was written by Woodrow Bellamy III, Senior Editor, SAE Media Group (New York, NY).