Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) has announced the successful launch of exactView-1 at UTC 06:41:39 into a sun synchronous polar orbit of 800km by a Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The 100kg exactView-1 is expected to be the highest detection performance commercial Automatic Identification System (AIS) satellite ever built and the fifth deployed satellite in exactEarth's advanced vessel monitoring satellite constellation which will provide near real-time AIS data on the locations, speeds and routes of vessels throughout the world's oceans.

Designed and assembled at SSTL in Guildford, the spacecraft is based on the SSTL-100 platform and has been adapted for the exactEarth mission with an additional deployable solar panel providing extra power for the COM DEV AIS receiver payload.

SSTL acted as launch agent in collaboration with Commercial Space technologies (CST) in Russia and exactView-1 is the 37th SSTL satellite successfully launched, of which 23 were arranged by SSTL on behalf of its customers.

Following the successful launch, SSTL is beginning the commissioning of critical communications, control and power subsystems from its groundstation at Guildford, UK.