MOSCOW, February 19. /TASS/. Roscosmos will allocate about fifty billion rubles ($545 mln) to organize conveyor production of satellites with the weight up to 500 kg, CEO of the Russian state space corporation Yury Borisov said in an interview with the Pro Kosmos news portal.
Young specialists of Reshetnev company organized conveyor assembly of satellites after an excursion to a Kamaz truck maker plant without serious capital expenses and almost from improvised resources, Borisov said.
"This is a serious experience; it needs to be replicated. This conveyor was created to assembly satellites with the weight up to 100 kg, while we need to create a conveyor for spacecraft with the weight up to 500 kg. This is different process equipment and actually requires real costs. We actually planned about fifty billion rubles for that," the chief executive noted.
The main trend of modern cosmonautics is satellites with the weight of 500 kg and lower, Borisov noted. "[They] will constitute the base of low-orbit constellations having the highest demand at present. Requirements to such satellites are much lower than to the ones flying on medium and geostationary orbits," he added.