The project aims to launch the unmanned satellite, equipped with instruments made in Poland, in 2022.
Officials from Polish universities, Polish satellite technology company SatRevolution and US company Virgin Orbit signed an agreement to form the consortium on Wednesday in the southern city of Katowice.
The satellite will take photographs of the Red Planet and probably of one of its moons, Phobos, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
"The satellite will be Polish-produced, the equipment on board will be mostly Polish, and the planning and management of the mission will be undertaken by the Americans in cooperation with Poles,” said the project’s scientific director, Jan Dziuban, from the Wrocław University of Science and Technology in south-west Poland.
The consortium members did not give details of the cost of the mission.
Poland in 2017 unveiled plans to shell out millions to develop its own satellite systems and space technology under a National Space Programme.
(pk/gs)
Source: PAP