Celestia UK gears up for eScan expansion

Four new appointments have been made at senior level at the company's UK headquarters in Harwell, Oxfordshire to build on the current Celestia UK team and boost the business' technical and commercial capability. 

Dr Mehul Mehta has been appointed as Celestia UK’s new Business Unit Director, Digital.  A wireless systems professional with specific expertise in R&D, Dr Mehta has designed solutions for 3GPP, WiMAX and WiFi standards and managed numerous projects and engineering teams across multiple locations.  He holds a PhD in wireless communications from the University of Southampton and joins from Blu Wireless Technology Ltd, where he spent the last decade as VP Modem Design. 

His focus at Celestia UK will comprise strategic planning and business development alongside technical activities including system architecture, radio communications, satcomms, 5G, beamforming and algorithms.

From his UK base, the newly appointed Celestia UK Strategy Director, Steve Jones, will support the senior team in meeting their ambitious development and commercialisation plans. Steve is the former Commercial Director and Co-Founder of Goonhilly Earth Station Ltd, where he played a key role in delivering funding packages to acquire and redevelop the Goonhilly site. 

Steve’s experience and relationships in the space communications sector will complement the company’s extensive technical expertise. He said: "I am delighted to join such an impressive team and contribute to the continued growth of Celestia Technologies Group."

Dr Carlo Rizzo, a recognised authority in the antenna testing and validation domain, has become Sales Director for the Antenna Business Unit, with his main focus being to grow the current customer base in the UK, US and EU and also provide invaluable advice on the eScan testing and validation needs. He holds a PhD from Sheffield University and is a senior member of the AMTA association.  

On the technical side, the business has brought in Ana Ruiz as Project Manager.  Ana is a seasoned engineer with 20 years’ experience who will deploy her expertise and technical leadership across the antenna and radio frequency arena. She is a telecommunications engineering graduate of Cantabria University and holds a master’s degree in Antennas from the University of Pavía.    
 
Additionally, a dozen new jobs will be created in the next quarter in engineering, technical design and project management roles in the UK as the company embarks on the second phase of its eScan development programme.

In announcing the investment in the new resource, José Alonso (above), Chairman of the Celestia Technologies Group said: "We are gearing up here in the UK in readiness for this major launch and building our team so we are perfectly placed to capitalise on the development of the ESA-funded eScan project.

"With phase one of the eScan project complete and signed off, and phase two already well underway, we have made additional investment in the resources required to move forwards.  We are starting to see great interest from large mega satellite constellation customers excited by this step-changing technology which will enable greater reliability, lower cost and improved performance."

The eScan project is part of the company's wider UK investment and growth plans designed to address the technical challenges of providing extremely capable ground-based architecture to maximise the space-based investment.