{"id":383642,"date":"2026-01-02T14:13:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T14:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/383642\/"},"modified":"2026-01-02T14:13:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T14:13:08","slug":"toronto-based-kepler-vies-for-a-spot-in-the-global-space-data-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/383642\/","title":{"rendered":"Toronto-based Kepler vies for a spot in the global space-data race"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Kepler Communications co-founder and CEO Mina Mitry in the assembly and test facility at the company’s head office in Toronto in November, 2025.Sammy Kogan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Inside a century-old, four-storey building in Toronto\u2019s Junction neighbourhood, a team of Canadian engineers is preparing to thrust the result of a decade\u2019s endeavours into outer space. <\/p>\n

The brick building, once home to a Canadian General Electric plant, today is filled with sleek metal machines and a positive-pressure cleanroom for precise, contaminant-free assembly of satellites \u2013 10 of which Kepler Communications Inc. will launch into orbit this month. <\/p>\n

Staff of the Toronto-based space company weave through the office past a radio-frequency testing chamber lined with blue wave-absorbing foam spikes. <\/p>\n

Others concentrate on debugging specialized computer components or gaze up at a wall of screens in the control room, monitoring the company\u2019s existing satellites as they circle the earth. <\/p>\n

In the middle of it all is Mina Mitry, Kepler\u2019s chief executive officer and co-founder, preparing to blast the first batch of the company\u2019s optical-satellites-slash-data-centres into orbit from Vandenberg Space Force Base in southern California.<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Mr. Mitry in the anechoic chamber his company uses to conduct testing of radios and antennas for satellite deployment.Sammy Kogan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Kepler\u2019s latest satellite constellation will build on the technology developed by the company since its founding in 2015, and is a milestone toward its goal of enabling real-time computation in space and communication of that data. <\/p>\n

And the launch is coming at just the right moment. <\/p>\n

Globally, competition to operationalize optical networks in outer space is red-hot, with some of the world\u2019s biggest companies vying for a slice of the market. Meanwhile, many countries are doubling down on defence<\/a> spending, making the distant skies the next frontier for military surveillance and communication.<\/p>\n

Historically, outer space has been the domain of technological and governmental giants, and founding a satellite startup in Canada was once a liability, Mr. Mitry says. <\/p>\n

But new defence needs, global space funding programs and commercial launch capabilities have opened a gap for new entrants \u2013 and Kepler is hoping to lead the way for Canadian space startups as the country leans into defending its sovereignty in an unstable world. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere has never been more demand for access to real-time information,\u201d said Mr. Mitry. \u201cWe\u2019ve built the infrastructure. It\u2019s here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Mr. Mitry by the thermal vacuum his company uses to conduct component testing in a zero-bar environment for space deployment.Sammy Kogan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Out of his siblings, Mr. Mitry says he was the one his parents thought \u201cwould never go anywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Mitry immigrated to Canada from Egypt with his parents and siblings when he was six years old. He credits his two older sisters for tutoring him through high school and encouraging him to save up for university, something he did by taking three jobs in high school (at Future Shop, Rona and Costco) and skipping classes to go to work. <\/p>\n

He said he scraped by during the first year of an engineering degree at the University of Toronto. It wasn\u2019t until after second year that he hit his stride once he joined the school\u2019s engineering design team and started to build remote-controlled aircraft. There, he grew the club from five members to more than 100 and raised millions of dollars in sponsorship and partnerships. <\/p>\n

After undergrad, he entered a master\u2019s program funded by aerospace manufacturer Pratt & Whitney to research, and later implement, aircraft engine optimization. The company offered to fund his PhD, but he dropped out just five days into the program. \u201cI didn\u2019t really enjoy the commercialization effort,\u201d he said, as ultimately, any intellectual property he created would have belonged to Pratt & Whitney. <\/p>\n

At this time in the mid 2010s, he said, he was noticing a trend in the background: access to space was getting democratized as commercial launches like those offered by Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX were becoming available, opening the door for new business applications. \u201cAll of a sudden, you had ready access for a few hundred thousand dollars,\u201d Mr. Mitry said. <\/p>\n

Opinion: Canada faces a once-in-a-generation opportunity to stake a serious claim in space<\/a><\/p>\n

Despite this, data transfer from satellites down to Earth was still very slow. <\/p>\n

Mr. Mitry set his sights on solving that problem, gathered Jeffrey Osborne, Mark Michael and Wen Cheng Chong \u2013 a group he knew from the university design team \u2013 and pitched them on founding a company to enable instantaneous satellite-to-Earth communication. <\/p>\n

\u201cI remember sitting in a room at the university, saying, \u2018Are you guys going to leave your jobs? Are we going to do this, or what?\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cWe knew the problem we were going to solve. We had no idea exactly how to solve it.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2015, the four engineers founded Kepler Communications. <\/p>\n

Within a decade, Kepler has grown from a scrappy new company to one of the country\u2019s largest space startups, with 200 employees, 23 satellites launched, major contracts with private companies and the Canadian and European space agencies, and even bigger ambitions.<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

For Mr. Mitry, space sovereignty is not just about owning the satellite \u2013 it\u2019s about the ability to launch those satellites into space.Sammy Kogan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

The problem that Kepler is aiming to solve is a perennial one in space communication. <\/p>\n

Traditional radio-based satellites often operate like cell towers in the sky, storing information and passing it down as they pass over a stationary antenna on Earth, delaying data by between minutes and hours. <\/p>\n

Kepler\u2019s optical system aims to significantly reduce that latency through its optical connectivity ring, which uses lasers to communicate with other satellites up to 6,500 kilometres away, and both optical and radio links to reach Earth, Mr. Mitry said. <\/p>\n

The lasers send information by rapidly flashing lights on and off, the same type of link used to communicate signals through fibre optic cables. They are more power efficient and have higher bandwidth than radio communication, Mr. Mitry said. <\/p>\n

Instead of downlinking all the data to Earth for processing, Kepler performs computation aboard its own satellites, which are designed to withstand dramatic temperature fluctuations, intense vibration and radiation from solar flares. In addition to its networking and computing capabilities, Kepler will sell access to space by hosting third-party sensors on its satellites.<\/p>\n

Canada\u2019s space companies make national-security pitch for chunk of defence dollars<\/a><\/p>\n

The 10 satellites to be launched this month, each weighing 300 kilograms, will be followed by 10 more, two years later.<\/p>\n

Kepler is not the only company working on optical networks. Companies like Germany\u2019s Tesat are also developing them, while SpaceX and Lockheed Martin, among others, operate satellites with optical technology. <\/p>\n

But John Ruffolo, founder and managing partner of Maverix Private Equity, said it was Kepler\u2019s vertical integration of design, manufacturing, networking and hosting that led him to back the company.<\/p>\n

While other companies like Starlink also integrate a full technology stack, he said, Kepler uses an open architecture system, meaning that the company\u2019s technology is interoperable with other systems, opening up commercial opportunities. <\/p>\n

Moreover, Mr. Ruffolo said that Kepler\u2019s Canadian identity is a significant differentiator, as it offers global clients a trusted alternative to Chinese and American companies. Increasingly, concerns that the U.S. government could interfere with American-owned private companies are driving interest among investors in backing a Canadian option, he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf all of our communications are eventually going to be in space, we had better play a role in that. Otherwise, we\u2019re going to become a branch plant,\u201d Mr. Ruffolo said.<\/p>\n

Canada to increase funding to European Space Agency over several years<\/a><\/p>\n

Already, Kepler is leaning into the opportunities resulting from the domestic push for dual-use technologies, with both defence and civil applications. In October, the company \u2013 which controls the satellites and the routing of data through Canada, under Canadian law \u2013 was awarded a multiyear contract from Defence Research and Development Canada to demonstrate real-time data sharing and connectivity, including for monitoring the Canadian Arctic. <\/p>\n

So far, Kepler has raised more than $200-million, including a $122.7-million Series C round in 2023, which has allowed the company to fully fund the build-out of its optical network. It is currently raising additional funding. Mr. Mitry said it will disclose further information about that \u201cin due time.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Mr. Mitry, space sovereignty is not just about owning the satellite \u2013 it\u2019s about the ability to launch those satellites into space. After all, SpaceX \u2013 the company sending Kepler\u2019s spacecraft into orbit in January, and the leading commercial launch provider globally \u2013 could opt to stop offering that access at any time, he said.<\/p>\n

In the recent federal budget, Ottawa dedicated $182.6-million over three years through the Department of Defence to establish sovereign launch capabilities. Mr. Mitry said he thinks Canada should focus on developing capabilities in underserved categories \u2013 for instance, launching satellites of about 5,000 kilograms of mass \u2013 that will be useful not just for Canada, but also for its allies and commercial partners.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we want to get sovereignty right, it\u2019s not just about serving Canada. Serving Canada is interesting, but not globally relevant. So picking a white space that you can play in, that has global relevance is so, so important,\u201d Mr. Mitry said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Kepler Communications co-founder and CEO Mina Mitry in the assembly and test facility…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":383643,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,66,306,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-383642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-science","tag-space","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=383642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383642\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/383643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=383642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=383642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=383642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}