The Space Development Agency successfully got its Tranche 0 satellites off the ground April 2, two and half years after it first awarded the contract. Those two and a half years included a few extra days of delays, but when a SpaceX rocket lifted off ...
If all goes well, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will lift off at 7:29 a.m. Pacific time from Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif., on March 30, carrying the first pieces of the Space Force’s planned constellation of low-Earth orbit satellites. Two and a half years after ...
The Space Development Agency’s warfighter council will set requirements in March for the second large batch of satellites to join the Transport Layer of the agency’s National Defense Space Architecture, a planned constellation in low Earth orbit. A solicitation will then go out in the ...
Some of the satellites that will form the planned “backbone” of joint all-domain command and control may include “translation” payloads to let other satellites feed their data into the Pentagon’s massive mesh network, the head of the Space Development Agency said Oct. 25. SDA is ...
China is building up its space capabilities at an “incredible rate”—and it has done so by embracing needed principles the U.S. has historically been slow to adopt, top Space Force officials said. Speaking at the Mitchell Institute’s Spacepower Security Forum, both Vice Chief of Space ...
Tim Ryan of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies moderated a discussion on "The Reality of Space as a Warfighting Domain" with Maj. Gen. Douglas A. Schiess, Space Force deputy commanding general for operations; Derek M. Tournear, director of the Space Development Agency; Robert Atkin ...
The Space Development Agency awarded L3Harris and Northrop Grumman Strategic Space Systems contracts to build Tranche 1 of the Tracking Layer for its planned National Defense Space Architecture, a multipurpose defense constellation. Each company will build 14 low-Earth-orbit satellites to detect and track the infrared ...
The Space Development Agency is looking to buy 10 satellites capable of carrying experimental payloads to integrate into its National Defense Space Architecture. The planned new satellites are being referred to as the National Defense Space Architecture Experimental Testbed, or NExT, and will “demonstrate warfighter ...
The Space Development Agency has awarded contracts for the 126 satellites that will make up its Tranche 1 Transport Layer, splitting the deal between Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and York Space Systems, it announced Feb. 28. All told, the three contracts for 42 satellites each ...
When it comes to developing and deploying new technologies for the Space Force and other space-focused units in the Defense Department, the Space Development Agency wants to be on a two-year cycle. But influential Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) criticized that plan as too slow and ...
Pentagon officials are nailing down what the military wants to see from its next round of new satellites procured by the Space Development Agency, with a request for proposals due out this summer, the agency’s director said Feb. 16. The Defense Department is in the ...
Disruption is generally thought of as the result of technological change. But the really disruptive changes happen when several new technologies converge. Welcome to the world of Space Force acquisition, where officials are trying to figure out how to change the game.