Media Lario awarded contract for the IRIDE Very High-Resolution Optical Payload

Media Lario has been awarded a contract by Thales Alenia Space (JV Thales 67% and Leonardo 33%) for the supply of the Very High Resolution (VHR) Optical Payload for IRIDE, a government project funded by Italy's National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) and managed by the European Space Agency (ESA) with the support of the Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (ASI).

IRIDE is a hybrid constellation of satellites realized in Italy with dedicated Earth Observation (EO) sensors. The VHR satellite is built on the modular NIMBUS (New Italian Micro Bus) platform of Thales Alenia Space, designed for high-revisit and high-capacity constellations. The VHR optical payload, to be built by Media Lario, is equipped with a high-performance image detector to provide very high-resolution images of Italy and Europe in the visible spectrum of light. Project partner TSD-Space, located near Naples Italy, will provide the focal plane and imaging electronics of the payload. The VHR payload will be built and tested in the Media Lario facilities in northern Italy. Media Lario will deliver the first IRIDE VHR payload in the first quarter 2025.