Several satellite engineering domains already adopt a standardised digital format, however the communication subsystem still uses and outdated approach, namely link budget tables. Because of this, the concept of the Link Budget Data Format (LBDF) is introduced which is a standardised, digital format to share link budget data. This thesis presents a conversion tool to convert the satellite link budget data from Redwire Space’s calculation tool to the LBDF standard. The impact of this approach is studied by taking interviews of both Redwire Space and European Space Agency (ESA) employees. These interviews show that the LBDF tool has a great impact on the time consumption of the data exchange and verification process, the error reduction due to the elimination of the manual copy-paste process and finally, cost savings. On top of this, the newly created tool provides opportunities within the company to automate their own processes such as the verification and optimisation of the link budget. A new verification tool shows a fully verified link budget of the Analysis of Resolved Remnants of Accreted galaxies as a Key Instrument for Halo Surveys (ARRAKIHS) mission, while a new optimisation tool calculates the maximum achievable data rate for different modulation and coding schemes considered for the ARRAKIHS mission. The theoretical optimal solution deemed to be 8 Phase Shift Keying (PSK) modulation with concatenated coding of Reed-Solomon and convolutional coding. Both tools use the new LBDF file as input and greatly improve the speed of these processes.

With the alignment of the planets in the 2030s, a perfect opportunity is presented to explore the outer reaches of the Solar System. With this, studying Uranus would become possible. With it being one of the least studied planets in the Solar System, the demand for accurate scientific data is high. This is where Ouranos comes in. This project has the specific purpose to design a scientific mission to Uranus, where measurements will be taken of its atmosphere. The summary below highlights the important parts and results of this report.