Res Communis

A U.S. company, Space Adventures, says it struck a deal to offer tourists a chance to go to the International Space Station.

The arrangement between Space Adventures, the Russian Federal Space Agency and Rocket Space Corporation Energia designates three seats on the Soyuz spacecraft for commercial passengers, the Vienna, Va., company said Wednesday in a release. Space Adventures didn’t disclose its financial arrangement or how much it will charge its customers.

LONDON INSTITUTE OF SPACE POLICY AND LAW

Practitioner and Industry Workshop

Wednesday 9 February 2011

Financing Space Assets: The UNIDROIT Solution Examined

Convention on International Interest in Mobile Equipment: Space Protocol

Funding the acquisition and operation of satellites and other space objects present the same challenges as those associated with any high value equipment. In addition their location outside any territorial jurisdiction adds to the complexity of the funding transaction. The International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (Unidroit), in a departure from its normal practice of harmonising the rules of national law on a given subject with a view to promoting international commerce, has promoted a Convention on International Interests in Mobile Equipment.[1] The Convention seeks to promote and expand the availability of asset-based financing in respect of high-value mobile equipment normally moving from country to country or beyond any national jurisdiction in the ordinary course of business.

The Convention has been applied to aircraft and rolling stock by means of protocols relevant to those assets. Unidroit proposes the application of the Convention by means a Space Protocol. The aim is to provide the creditor with greater legal certainty to facilitate grant of assets based finance in respect of assets it may otherwise find difficult to repossess or control.

Several governments are in the process of reviewing and deciding whether to adopt the Protocol. This Workshop will examine the efficacy of the Space Protocol to achieve greater availability and ease of funding for space projects. It will explore the needs of operators, financiers and insurers. Professor Roy Goode has graciously agreed to present the Protocol and outline the obstacles to funding space equipment and the solution proposed. There will be an examination of the legal basis for the Protocol in the context of the Convention, its perception by those directly affected by its operation.

It is intended that the Workshop be highly participatory, discussing the issues from all relevant perspectives.

The Fee for the Seminar is: Delegate £50, Academic and Government £25, Student Free

To register please send your name and affiliation, by e-mail headed “Unidroit Workshop” to: Events@Space-Institute.org

Programme Outline

Wednesday 9 February 2011

8:30 to 13:00

Chairman: [To be confirmed]

8:30 – 9:30 Unidroit Perspective

The Perceived Problem, the Convention and Protocol, Solution Protocol Proposes to Provides; Current status of UNIDROIT Process

Professor Roy Goode

9:30 – 10:00 Legal Issues

The Legal Structure, Purpose of the Convention, Protocol in the Context of the Convention, Definitional Issues

Sa’id Mosteshar

ISPL Director

10:00 – 10:45 Potential Beneficiaries

Developing Country Operator

TBC

Small Satellite Operator

Kumar Singarajah

Director of Regulatory Affairs, Avanti; ISPL Faculty

11:00 – 11.45 Operators’ Perspective

Satellite Operator

Ann Vandenbroucke

Manager – Regulatory and Policy Issues, Inmarsat; ISPL Faculty

11:45 – 12:15 Finance Sector Perspective

TBC

12:15 – 12:45 Insurance Perspective

Impact on insurance availability and premiums

Neil Stephens

General Counsel – Space, Atrium Space Insurance; ISPL Faculty

Cannes - Thales Alenia Space announced that it has signed end December 2010, a contract with French space agency CNES (Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales) to produce the Surface Waves Investigation and Monitoring (SWIM) instrument. This wave-scatterometer spectrometer was chosen within the scope of a joint French-Chinese program to develop an Earth observation satellite, the “China France Oceanography Satellite” (CFOSAT), built jointly by CNES and the China National Space Administration (CNSA).

The CFOSAT satellite will detect and characterize surface winds and ocean wave spectrum properties. Mission objectives are to understand, monitor and characterize sea surface states (winds and waves) over the entire planet, then incorporate this information in meteorology and climatology models. The SWIM instrument will be paired with the SCAT instrument made by China to form the payload for the CFOSAT satellite, which will be based on a CAST platform.