Eventually the company is hoping to use its research to create orbiting systems that can fling other satellites into deep space, but seeing how the last Dneprrocket crashed and burned on liftoff in 2006, Team Tether is probably best off taking this endeavor one step at a time.
The mission -- called MAST (for Multi-Application Survivable Tether) -- is scheduled to begin April 17th with a payload launch on a Dneprrocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, after which the Washington state-based Tethers Unlimited's two anchor sats (less-cleverly dubbed Ted and Ralph -- um, hello, Penny and Brain...) will gradually separate until they've pulled the kilometer-long line taut.