WISeKey International Holding Ltd (“WISeKey “), a leading global cybersecurity, AI, Blockchain and IoT company, today announced the successful launch of its first IoT connectivity satellites aboard SpaceX transporter rideshare 3 mission.
With this launch, WISeKey is kickstarting WISeSAT, a brand-new-offering-satellite-based secure IoT connectivity-as-a-service. WISeSAT offers the satellite platform, launch, integration, ground station services and the all the security architecture and components, as part of a turnkey SaaS solution for low-power and secure space-based IoT connectivity. This reduces the complexity and cost of the communication link for the end customer and sets the benefits of space technology and embedded security within the reach of every IoT business.
Miniaturization enables cost reduction to a level that positions the WISeSAT offering, as a competitive solution, even compared to traditional ground-based connectivity like NBIoT networks. Thus, any company could virtually afford such dedicated satellites to provide connectivity to any size of ecosystems.
Indeed, a first customer project dedicated to smart agriculture and IoT is already on its way with EPRINSA, a Spanish state-owned I.T. company. Six provinces of Spain have been involved in the project and are considering using the WISeSAT constellation for data acquisition of hundreds of thousands of sensors located in territories not normally covered by traditional ground-based networks.
The satellites have been designed and developed in partnership with FOSSA Systems, a leading aerospace company focused on developing picosatellites for IoT communications. Both, WISeSat-1 and WISeSat-2, will be managed from the ground by the recently installed control station. based in La Línea de la Concepcion, Spain, as announced in December 2021, by the two companies.
Satellites, nodes and sensors, all feature hardware security by design, incorporating a VaultIC® 4XX secure element, providing FIPS 140-2 level 3 and Common Criteria EAL 5+ Certification. The secure element, provisioned with a trusted identity using WISeKey’s VaultITrust to secure provisioning services, enables authentication of the sensor and data encryption, under the framework of a PKI-based security architecture. Additionally, WISeKey’s Certificate Lifecycle Management services (INeS), can provide the user interface and automation features to handle onboarding, commissioning and lifecycle management of the devices and sensors. This complete, device-to-cloud, state-of-the-art suite of services in IoT security architecture, can only be currently found at WISeKey as a standalone one-piece vertical solution.
WISeKey and FOSSA Systems are also working on the development of secure nodes and gateways with VaultIC® microcontrollers, creating a full ecosystem of secure devices, able to communicate with WISeSat, using standardized communication modules.
“This technology, which WISeKey intends to offer to its IoT clients in a SaaS model, creates another revenue stream for the Company. By using this technology, companies seeking to securely connect their assets, would be able to have both remote and redundant urban IoT communications and at the same time, have the ability of covering large and unserved geographic areas such as maritime, deserts, and mountains, at an affordable cost.”
Carlos Moreira, CEO of WISeKey
About WISeKey
WISeKey is a leading global cybersecurity company currently deploying large scale digital identity ecosystems for people and objects using Blockchain, AI and IoT respecting the Human as the Fulcrum of the Internet. WISeKey microprocessors secure the pervasive computing shaping today’s Internet of Everything. WISeKey IoT has an install base of over 1.6 billion microchips in virtually all IoT sectors (connected cars, smart cities, drones, agricultural sensors, anti-counterfeiting, smart lighting, servers, computers, mobile phones, crypto tokens…). WISeKey is uniquely positioned to be at the edge of IoT as our semiconductors produce a huge amount of Big Data that, when analyzed with Artificial Intelligence (AI), can help industrial applications to predict the failure of their equipment before it happens.
Our technology is Trusted by the OISTE/WISeKey’s Swiss based cryptographic Root of Trust (“RoT”) provides secure authentication and identification, in both physical and virtual environments, for the Internet of Things, Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence. The WISeKey RoT serves as a common trust anchor to ensure the integrity of online transactions among objects and between objects and people. For more information, visit www.wisekey.com.