[2] It is operated by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and forms part of the Australia Telescope National Facility.

Development and construction of ASKAP was led by CSIRO Space and Astronomy, in collaboration with scientists and engineers in the Netherlands, Canada, and the US, as well as colleagues from Australian universities and industry partners in China.

[8] The radio quiet location is recognised as a natural resource and protected by the Australian Commonwealth and Western Australia State Government through a range of regulatory measures.

[10] All data are made publicly available after quality checks by the ten ASKAP Survey Science Teams.

It was the first aperture synthesis radio telescope to use phased array feed technology, enabling the formation of up to nine dual-polarisation beams.

[citation needed] The first prototype phased-array feeds (PAF) proved the concept worked, but their performance was not optimum.

The main changes were:[citation needed] Although the ADE delayed the completion of ASKAP, this was felt to be justified as the resulting system had better performance, was lower cost, and more reliable.

[citation needed] From 2015 until 2019, a series of ASKAP Early Science Projects[24] were observed on behalf of the astronomical community, across all areas of astrophysics, with the primary goals of demonstrating the capabilities of ASKAP, providing data to the astronomy community to facilitate development of techniques, and evaluating the performance and characteristics of the system.