For its fifth mission in 2020 and the first Vega flight of the year, Arianespace will orbit 53 satellites on the Small Spacecraft Mission Service (SSMS) Proof of Concept (PoC) Flight, performed on behalf of 21 customers from 13 countries.

With this mission, designated Flight VV16, Arianespace underscores its comprehensive range of innovative and very competitive services to address the nano- and micro-satellite market sub-segment, serving both institutional and commercial needs. The creation of such a new service using the company’s light-lift Vega led to the SSMS project.

VV16’s mission will serve different types of applications: earth observation, telecommunications, science, technology/education, etc.

Liftoff is planned on Tuesday, September 2, 2020, at exactly:

- 9:51:10 p.m., Washington, D.C. time,
- 10:51:10 p.m., Kourou, French Guiana time,
- 01:51:10, Universal Time (UTC), on September 3,
- 03:51:10 a.m., Paris and Rome time, on September 3.

The Vega launch vehicle and its 53 spacecraft payloads…

Today’s NASA SLS solid rocket booster test in Utah from start to finish: https://t.co/2UbSwOeBYl

The Vega rocket’s Ukrainian-built upper stage engine has reignited to circularize the rocket’s orbit at an altitude 320 miles (515 kilometers) before separation of the mission’s first seven satellites.

WATCH: https://t.co/9mmCmdKVgO

We have contact and healthy beacons from #Hypatia! Ad astra!! 🚀🛰️🔝

And now it’s raining #cubesats... all says deployed. #vega #ssms