{"id":411897,"date":"2026-01-15T23:07:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-15T23:07:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/411897\/"},"modified":"2026-01-15T23:07:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-15T23:07:07","slug":"u-of-t-space-company-launches-largest-canadian-satellite-fleet-globe-and-mail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/411897\/","title":{"rendered":"U of T space company launches largest Canadian satellite fleet: Globe and Mail"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Kepler Communications Inc., a Toronto-based space company founded in 2015 by four University of Toronto graduate students, has cemented its position as the operator of the largest fleet of Canadian-built spacecraft after recently launching 10 satellites aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/canada\/article-kepler-communications-nasa-exoplanet-mission-successful-launch\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the Globe and Mail\u00a0reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Mina Mitry, Kepler\u2019s CEO and an alumnus of U of T\u2019s Faculty of Applied Science &amp; Engineering, watched the launch\u00a0alongside other company representatives, including adviser and former Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield. \u201cIt was absolutely amazing to watch,\u201d Mitry told the Globe after observing the controlled landing of the rocket\u2019s first stage at the launch site at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.<\/p>\n<p>With 33 satellites now in orbit, Kepler has developed a space-based optical network that uses lasers to communicate between satellites up to 6,500 kilometres away, significantly reducing data latency compared to traditional radio-based systems, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/business\/article-kepler-satellites-canadian-space-sovereignty\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">according to a separate Globe feature on the company<\/a>\u00a0published earlier this month.\u00a0The satellites perform onboard computation and support applications ranging from wildfire monitoring to Arctic surveillance.<\/p>\n<p>Mitry, who immigrated to Canada from Egypt with his family when he was six, told the Globe\u00a0that he hit his stride at U of T during his second year when he helped grow the University of Toronto Aerospace Team and met fellow Kepler co-founders\u00a0Jeffrey Osborne, Mark Michael and Wen Cheng Chong. The company, which received early support from several U of T incubators and accelerators, has since raised more than $200 million.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/canada\/article-kepler-communications-nasa-exoplanet-mission-successful-launch\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read about Kepler\u2019s satellite launch in the Globe and Mail<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/business\/article-kepler-satellites-canadian-space-sovereignty\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Read a feature story about Kepler in\u00a0the Globe and Mail<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kepler Communications Inc., a Toronto-based space company founded in 2015 by four University of Toronto graduate students, has&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":411898,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[49,48,66,306],"class_list":["post-411897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411897","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=411897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411897\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/411898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=411897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=411897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=411897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}