ESA Open Invitation to Tender AO9754
Open Date: 09/10/2019
Closing Date: 19/02/2020 13:00:00

Status: ISSUED
Reference Nr.: 19.1TT.31
Prog. Ref.: CC for Advanced Tech
Budget Ref.: E/0505-01C – CC for Advanced Tech
Special Prov.: BE+DK+FR+DE+IT+NL+ES+SE+CH+GB+IE+AT+NO+FI+PT+GR+LU+CZ+RO+CA+HU
Tender Type: C
Price Range: > 500 KEURO
Products: Ground Segment / Ground Station / RF equipment / Transmitter and Receiver assemblies, Frequency converters, …
Technology Domains: RF Systems, Payloads and Technologies / RF Technologies and Equipment / RF Equipment
Establishment: ESTEC
Directorate: Directorate Telecom & Integrated Applica
Department: Telecom Technologies,Product&Systems Dep
Division: Technologies and Products Division
Contract Officer: Piesche, Claudia Ria
Industrial Policy Measure: C2 – Activities in open competition, significant partecipat…
Last Update Date: 09/10/2019
Update Reason: Tender issue

The objective of the activity is to design, manufacture and test a prototype of a wideband multiport (at least 16 input ports) power combiner for ground terminals operating over multiple frequency bands (C, X, Ku and Ka). Targeted Improvements:- Enabling the use of multiport amplifiers deploying single wideband HPAs (20W combined output power) and graceful degradation in comparison to today’s state of the art multiplexed solution with HPAs for each band and no graceful degradation;- Doubling the bandwidth of current state-of-art multiport microwave power combiners.Description: Modern SATCOM ground applications such as Fly-Away terminals,Machine-to-Machine (M2M) and SATCOM on the move, are offering multi-band operation starting from C-band up to V-band. Multiband ground terminals are usually built with several different high power amplifier modules. Whensimultaneous operation of several bands isrequired, the power consumption of the amplifiers combined with a multiplexer network is significantly decreasing the overall power efficiency of the system.Currently there are available wideband MMIC amplifiers and modules covering very wide frequency ranges. Should these amplifiers be connected efficiently by means of a wideband power combiner, they could offer a solution for high power multi-band operation. Advanced RF power combining solutions such as quasi-optical (radial) power combiner offer the possibility to combine signal power from a non-binary number of sources. Other concepts such as microwave lens power combiner, or coaxial power combiner with higher power handling could also offer very wideband performance. This activity shall design, manufacture and test, a power combiner prototype of at least 16 input ports with low insertion loss, low ripple, and high portto-port isolation over the frequency bands C, X, Ku, and Ka. Technology challenges related to the use of novel dielectric materials and fabrication techniques in orderto increase combining efficiency and improve temperature management shall be investigated. The prototype combiner should demonstrate high RF power handling through the interface architecture that enables modular integration. This activity shall provide the enabling technologyfor multiple operation of emerging services (e.g. SOTM, M2M, 5G systems, ). The solution shall offer reduced size, improved thermalmanagement, and high combination efficiency of ground terminals with independent (battery) power supply.Procurement Policy: C(2) = A relevant participation (in terms of quality and quantity) of non-primes (incl. SMEs) is required. For additional information please go to EMITS news “Industrial Policy measures for non-primes, SMEs and RD entities in ESA programmes”.