Alba Orbital Reporting Unicorn-2C Smallsat Success

Alba Orbital has announced the end of the mission and re-entry of Unicorn-2C (NOOR 1B), Alba’s first Unicorn spacecraft to make orbit.

The spacecraft successfully deployed its quadruple deployable solar panel and the customer operator confirmed reception of spacecraft signal. This is a great first step in space, moving the system to TRL-9.


The Unicorn-2C smallsat. Photo is courtesy of Alba Orbital.

While this was an experimental mission, the company is proud to reach this milestone and looks forward to upgrading Unicorn-2.0 to our Unicorn-2.1 architecture for new customers.

Achievements of the mission

  • First smallsat to successfully deploy quadruple deployable solar panels
  • First PocketQube to deploy a solar panel
  • First operational 3p PocketQube in history
  • Validation of Unicorn subsystems: Structure, Thermal, Backplane (OBC/EPS), Alba Radio, Unicorn OS (Software),
  • System moves from TRL-8 to TRL-9.
  • First full spacecraft delivered in-orbit to a commercial customer
  • FCC licensed, demonstrating route to license PocketQube in the US.
  • Contract kickoff to in-orbit deployment in under 1 year

Missions stats

Time on Orbit: 123 days (4 months, 1 day)

TLEs: 288

Average TLEs per day: 2.34

TLEs average update rate: 10 hrs 15 minutes

Injection Orbit Albapod: 403 x 348km, 97 degrees incl.

Learn more about using Unicorn-2 at this direct infolink…

Posted in News.