TytoSpace Request a pilot
TytoSpace · Ground station software

Your ground station, built on software.

The receive side of a ground station in software: a virtual modem that turns an antenna and an SDR into a ground station as a service, with a signal lab for every pass.

Request a pilotSee the spec sheet

In operation at the Poznań University of Technology ground stations · Space Arena 2026 finalist

Measured: more data, less hardware
Reference decoders4,066
TytoSpace6,220 · +53%
$59k vs $511k+receive hardware and maintenance for a three-antenna station over five years

Bars: valid packets from 266 archived CANVAS recordings (FSK 9600), identical input, Dire Wolf and gr-satellites combined against TytoSpace; one mission, a cohort also used in development, higher compute. Station example: UHF, S-band and X-band antennas over five years, TytoSpace software licence not included; details in the Cost chapter.

01 · Cost

Add a module, not a rack unit.

Today a station is built antenna by antenna. Each dish or Yagi feeds its own rack of modems and receivers, the most expensive equipment in the station, and every unit carries its own paid licences. Operators set the equipment up for each pass by hand.

€107,000one S-band telemetry modem, per antenna
vs
$2,387a USRP B210 software-defined radio
$245k–398kone X-band high-rate receiver, per antenna
vs
~$15–18kUSRP B210 + server, enough for the 15 Msym/s we decoded

It doesn't have to be like this.

With TytoSpace each antenna needs only a software-defined radio and a small edge node. One GPU server processes every antenna, passes are planned and run automatically, and a new mission is a software module, not a licence upgrade.

TytoSpace also does what those boxes do not: it keeps the raw recording of every pass, recovers frames offline and identifies unknown signals.

Public procurement records: two Cortex CRT-Quantum units for €214,001 (DLR, 2021, TED 412189-2021); Cortex HDR receivers $244,944–398,000 (NASA, 2018–2023, USAspending). Ettus list prices. Hardware purchase only: the TT&C modems also transmit and range, which TytoSpace does not, and the TytoSpace software licence is not included. The X-band figure covers the highest rate TytoSpace has decoded so far, QPSK 15 Msym/s from NOAA-20; faster links need a wider SDR such as a USRP X410 ($33,020 list), which narrows the gap.

Example · UHF, S-band and X-band antennas · 5 years
Traditional
$511–661k
TytoSpace
~$59k + licence
  • X-band receiver$245kUSRP X410 · $33k
  • S-band telemetry modem~$116kUSRP B210 · $2.4k
  • UHF$0.4kUSRP B210 · $2.4k
  • Processingin each unitone GPU server · ~$21k
  • Maintenance, 5 years$150–300kin the licence

TytoSpace stays cheaper even with a licence of up to ~$90k a year.

Lowest public prices: Safran high-rate receiver $244,944 (NASA, 2023, USAspending); two Cortex CRT-Quantum €214,001 (DLR, 2021, TED 412189-2021), €107k each at about 1.08 USD/EUR; Kantronics KPC-9612XE TNC $430. Maintenance assumed at $15–30k a year for each of the two large units, from NASA maintenance renewals for a receive system. Ettus list prices; GPU server estimated from component list prices. Uplink is excluded on both sides.

02 · Plan · AI-powered

Every pass is planned before it rises.

TytoSpace Plan computes every pass over every antenna from current orbital elements, gives each one a quality score and books the antenna, the band and the processing in one step. Two bookings can never hold the same antenna, and the plan is sent to each edge node as a signed bundle, so a station keeps working offline.

Learned models predict which contacts will actually deliver data, using orbit geometry, weather and space weather, and an optimizer turns the predictions into a schedule for every antenna, around the clock. When something changes, the plan is rebuilt and pushed to the edge.

25 Oct 2026 · PoznańBooked
  1. 11:26 UTCNOAA-20 · max 79° · X-band · score 87
  2. 11:07 UTCSuomi NPP · max 52° · X-band · score 80
  3. 03:36 UTCAqua · max 66° · X-band · night pass
Score of the NOAA-20 pass
Elevation 34.4 / 35
Duration 20 / 20
Link margin 12.5 / 25 (EIRP unknown)
Sunlit 10 / 10
Free antenna 10 / 10

Passes on the dish are real receptions from 25 October 2026, scored with the TytoSpace Plan formula; the link-margin term falls back to half when the satellite's EIRP is unknown. Passes on the Yagis in the timeline are examples.

03 · More data

Two chances at every pass.

A real-time decoder catches what it can while the satellite is overhead. TytoSpace keeps the raw recording and decodes it a second time, with methods a real-time receiver cannot afford. Keep scrolling to watch it fill the gaps.

Two real passes · same recording, decoded twice
  1. LiveCELESTA telemetry: 3 frames. Meteor image: only after the decoder locks, 3,198 frames
  2. 2nd passCELESTA: 20 frames, including every charging-current spike. Meteor: the start of the pass, 3,700 frames

Telemetry: CELESTA, SatNOGS observation 6284801. gr-satellites decoded 3 frames, TytoSpace 20 from the same IQ; every frame passes CRC-16/X.25 and the 3 reference frames are among the 20. Values are the documented beacon fields in engineering units; the time axis is the analysis window, not onboard time. Image: one public Meteor-M2-2 recording, SatDump 1.2.2 3,198 frames, TytoSpace 3,700 (+502), every SatDump frame retained. The IQ trace is drawn for illustration. Methods: timing and phase hypotheses on overlapping windows, a channel model learned from validated frames with a Viterbi sequence detector, soft-list decoding; a frame counts only when its own CRC passes.

04 · Identification

Unknown signal? The modem works it out.

A traditional receiver is configured for the signal it expects. TytoSpace starts from the spectrum: it finds every carrier in the band, then tries combinations of modulation, symbol rate and coding for each one at the same time, spread across CPU cores and the GPU. A signal is named only when a combination yields valid frames. This is how TytoSpace locked onto PROBA-2 on 25 October 2026 without a prepared profile.

S-band scan · 2200–2290 MHz0 / 5
  1. 2203.4 MHzUnmodulated carrier (CW)
  2. 2215.0 MHzQPSK · 1 Msym/s
  3. 2235.0 MHzBPSK · 2 Msym/s · K=7 + Reed–Solomon · CCSDS frames valid
  4. 2250.0 MHz2-FSK · 38.4 kBd
  5. 2270.0 MHzOQPSK · 512 ksym/s

Keep scrolling to run the scan. The band is an illustration; the 2235 MHz entry uses the real PROBA-2 parameters.

05 · Modules

Build the chain you need.

Every stage of the receive chain is a module, and each one runs on the cheapest hardware that can do it. Ready-made modules cover 642 satellite profiles, so most missions need no new code. Your own module plugs in at any tier: on the FPGA, on the GPU or on the CPU.

  1. FPGAOn the radio: channel selection, Doppler correction, filtering and decimation, loaded before each pass so only a narrow stream leaves the antenna.
  2. GPUHeavy parallel work: hypothesis search, Viterbi and LDPC decoding
  3. CPUReed–Solomon, framing, CRC checks and products

GPU kernels: FIR filtering, K=7 Viterbi and DVB-S2 FEC on an NVIDIA A40. 27 demodulator and decoder modules; 642 satellite profiles have an executable receive plan, imported from open catalogues and qualified per mission.

Receive data from everything, everywhere, every time.

06 · Everywhere

Every kind of transmitter, every kind of station.

The same software runs on a mast in a field, on a 4.5 m dish, in an armoured vehicle or in a trench. On the battlefield it finds an unknown emitter, works out its modulation and decodes what it sends. Keep scrolling to switch the pair. Defence use →

  1. CubeSatUHF telemetry · Yagi station on a rotator
  2. SARRadar imaging satellite · tracking dish
  3. EOImagery downlink · tracking dish
  4. LaunchTelemetry during ascent · tracking dish
  5. SIGINTHostile military UAV and Shahed-type drone: two unknown emitters found, classified and decoded · 8x8 armoured vehicle
  6. AircraftFlight-test telemetry · field station in a trench

Airborne telemetry profiles: SOQPSK, CPM, PCM/FM.

Spec sheet

What TytoSpace does.

On air / real signalVerified on the benchDelivered per project

Receive

  • VHF, UHF, S and X band
  • Up to 15 Msym/s decoded (QPSK, NOAA-20)
  • FSK, GMSK, AFSK, BPSK, QPSK, OQPSK
  • AX.25, CCSDS, Reed–Solomon, K=7
  • DVB-S2/S2X, LDPC, Turbo, SOQPSK, CPM
  • Uplink and ranging

Software

  • 642 satellite profiles ready
  • +53% packets from recordings
  • Unknown signal to first frame in ~5 s
  • Signal lab for every pass
  • Scored, conflict-free planning
  • Learned planner tuned to your stations

Hardware

  • USRP B210, more via UHD and SoapySDR
  • ICOM IC-9700 for VHF/UHF
  • Rotators: rotctld, GS-232, Rot2Prog
  • GPU kernels on NVIDIA A40
  • FPGA front end on the radio

Operations

  • Edge node keeps recording offline
  • On premises or in the cloud
  • REST API, S3, DIFI/VITA-49, SSO
  • CCSDS SLE (RAF/RCF), tested with Yamcs
  • 22/22 fault-injection runs passed
  • 100 stations, no frame loss

Highest rate: NOAA-20 X-band, 958,134 frames from one recorded pass. Modulation and coding verified on real signals; DVB-S2 is bit-exact error correction against the reference, other items lab-only. Unknown-signal timing 5.1–5.8 s on replayed S-band recordings. Packet gain on 266 archived recordings. Reliability figures from bench tests; the availability objective is 99%.

What you still need

Antennas and LNAs, a downconverter for X-band, a control unit for large servo dishes, a time reference, network and UPS, and uplink equipment if you command the satellite.

Compared

How it stacks up.

Hardware modemSatNOGSAWS Ground StationTytoSpace
Hardware at each antennaModem rackSDRNone of your ownSDR + edge node
Cost, three antennas$511–661k over five yearsFree software, your engineering time$10–22 per contact minute~$59k over five years + licence
Your antennas, offline●●—●
Raw recording of every pass◐ option◐ optional● in your cloud● by default
Recovers missed frames◐ replay—◐ your software● +53%
Identifies unknown signals———●
New missionLicence upgradeNew profileYour softwareModule
Planning built in◐ separate●●●
Uplink and ranging●—●◐ per project

Hardware prices from public tenders (DLR on TED, NASA on USAspending). Paid options as documented by Kratos (quantumRadio), WORK Microwave and Safran. AWS Ground Station on-demand prices from the AWS price list. TytoSpace figures from our own benchmarks; the status of each feature is in the spec sheet. AWS charges per contact minute, so it has no fixed five-year total.

Pilot

How a pilot works.

  1. InstallWe put an edge node and a server beside your current receiver, on one antenna and one mission.
  2. Run side by sideYour passes are received by both. Nothing in your current chain changes.
  3. CompareYou get a report on valid frames, time to data and the cost of running it, and you keep the recordings.
You provide

A split of the RF or IF feed from one antenna, a server slot or virtual machine beside it, a network link, and the link parameters of one mission. We bring the software and set it up with you.

Pricing on request.

Start small

One antenna, one satellite, one pilot.

We install TytoSpace beside your current receiver and compare the results on your own passes: valid frames, time to data and the cost of running it.

Request a pilotSee the measurements