Space Minds: Catch up on conversations from Space Symposium

Watch a week of interviews with SpaceNews' Mike Gruss and space community leaders

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04/20/2026 READ IN BROWSER Unlimited access. Less than $5/week. Get all the news and analysis on SpaceNews.com, plus the digital magazine every month. Subscribe today. SPONSORED BY Last week, the SpaceNews team was out in force at the annual Space Symposium at Colorado Springs. There, Space Minds host Mike Gruss held a series of interviews on the convention floor with industry leaders, all of which you can watch below. Next: Our CEO Series returns later this week with conversations with leaders from Space Symposium, Satellite and more. Stay tuned. An interview with Col. Tim Trimailo, director of the Commercial Space Office, at Space Systems Command, about what the service wants to see from new companies, how they’re casting a wider net and what’s driving this need for speed. Watch now A converation with Alyssa Goessler, VP at AE Industrial Partners, about the rigor needed in evaluating companies, the new role for investors in government acquisition and what to watch for in the next 12 months. Watch now Mike chats with Nightwing VP Joe Mazur, covering the acceleration of cyber operations, the role of offensive cyber capabilities and how acquisition is evolving. Watch now An interview with Fang Qian, VP of GPS at Lockheed Martin, about the need for jam-resistant signals, what comes next for the constellation and thinking about GPS for the moon. Watch now SPONSORED Made to serve the mission. Hardwired to defend the nation. Against an ever-evolving threat landscape, Nightwing brings deep expertise and an unwavering commitment to U.S. national security. From cyberspace to dominance in orbit, Nightwing operates at the edge of complexity — delivering some of the world’s most technically advanced capabilities to see what others don’t, go where others won’t, and achieve what others can’t. Learn more. 📨 Don't miss what's next. Sign up for other SpaceNews newsletters: Europe Report: Tracking the policy landscape, investment climate and regional priorities driving Europe’s space ambitions. First Up: Every weekday morning, Jeff Foust delivers the day's most important industry headlines. Military Space: Veteran defense journalist Sandra Erwin with weekly news and insights for the military space professional. China Report: Biweekly news and analysis from correspondent Andrew Jones on business, politics and technology in the Chinese space industry. SpaceNext AI: Exploring the intersection of space and artificial intelligence. SpaceNews Mission Brief: Golden Dome: Explaining the Golden Dome initiative and what it means for the space industry. Marketing Minute: Covering PR, marketing and advertising trends for industry communications leaders.  Editor’s Choice: Our most important recent stories you may have missed, with background and insights from editors, reporters and contributors. Opinions: A weekly digest of the latest commentary and analysis. SpaceNews This Week: The week’s top headlines and our conference coverage. Subscribe to SpaceNews This email has been sent to generalastronomy110.stnirp@blogger.com because you previously opted in to receive emails from SpaceNews. Unsubscribe here. Sign up for other SpaceNews newsletters.  SpaceNews.com  |  Advertise with SpaceNews Contact us  |  Privacy policy  |  Terms and conditions SpaceNews.com  |  Advertise with SpaceNews  |  Contact us  |  Privacy policy  |  Terms and conditions © 2026, SpaceNews, 100 Fillmore Street, 5th Floor, Denver, CO 80206, United States

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New Glenn places AST SpaceMobile satellite in wrong orbit

Space Force weighs Vulcan launches without SRBs, China scales up satellite production

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04/20/2026 READ IN BROWSER Unlimited access. Less than $5/week. Get all the news and analysis on SpaceNews.com, plus the digital magazine every month. Subscribe today. SPONSORED BY By Jeff Foust In today's edition: New Glenn upper stage malfunction leads to loss of AST Space Mobile spacecraft, Canadian SSA company NorthStar to go public via SPAC merger, China's growing satellite manufacturing capabilities, and more.  If someone forwarded you this edition, sign up to receive it directly in your inbox every weekday. Have thoughts or feedback? You can hit reply to let me know directly. SPONSORED Blue Canyon Technologies’ control moment gyroscopes (CMGs) deliver 10 times more torque than traditional reaction wheels while using up to 5X less power, dramatically reducing spacecraft reorientation time. This increased agility, paired with exceptionally low jitter, maximizes payload-pointing opportunities and preserves mission data quality, making CMGs ideal for responsiveness-driven missions such as Earth observation and SSA. Once limited to large, traditional spacecraft, CMG-enabled performance is now available for small satellites. Blue Canyon has delivered multiple flight CMGs optimized for smallsat SWaP-C requirements, and its Saturn-400 platform integrates a CMG to provide turnkey, extreme agility and precision pointing in a single spacecraft solution. Top Stories A New Glenn launch on Sunday placed an AST SpaceMobile payload into the wrong orbit. The rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 7:25 a.m. Eastern on the NG-3 mission, carrying the BlueBird 7 satellite. About an hour after the scheduled payload deployment into low Earth orbit, Blue Origin announced the satellite had been deployed into an "off-nominal" orbit following an apparent issue with the rocket's upper stage. AST SpaceMobile said later that day that the orbit was too low for the spacecraft's electric propulsion to recover from and BlueBird 7 will be deorbited. The failure overshadowed the successful landing of the New Glenn booster, which was making its second flight after the NG-2 mission last November. However, Blue Origin had replaced the BE-4 engines in the booster between the two flights. AST SpaceMobile said that, despite the failure, it still expected to have 45 satellites in orbit by the end of the year; it currently has six. Shares in AST SpaceMobile were down about 15% in pre-market trading Monday. [SpaceNews] The Space Force is exploring if it can launch missions on United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket without using the vehicle's solid rocket boosters. Vulcan has been sidelined since its USSF-87 mission in February, when a performance anomaly appeared on one of its solid rocket boosters shortly after liftoff. The head of Space Systems Command said last week that the service is now evaluating whether Vulcan can fly missions that do not require boosters built by Northrop Grumman, which are central to the investigation. Lower-energy missions, such as launching batches of satellites for the Space Development Agency into low Earth orbit, could potentially fly without boosters. [SpaceNews] China is ramping up its ability to mass-manufacture satellites to support constellations. Chinese space industry outlet Hello Space has identified at least 55 satellite factories in China, with 36 already in operation. According to the analysis, this provides a total production capacity of 4,050 satellites per year from the already operational facilities, with a projected additional capacity of 3,310 satellites from the future factories. This is in part to help meet the requirements of the Guowang and Qianfan megaconstellations, which are planned to comprise a total of 28,000 satellites, as well as future proposed systems. However, the number of satellites actually reaching orbit is far lower than that capacity, thanks to launch constraints and the still-maturing commercial viability of large satellite constellations. [SpaceNews] Canadian space situational awareness company NorthStar Earth and Space plans to go public through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger. NorthStar said Friday it would merge with Viking Acquisition Corp. I, a publicly listed shell company that has $230 million in trust. How much of that cash ultimately reaches NorthStar will depend on shareholder redemptions ahead of the merger vote, although the deal is structured to deliver at least $30 million before any additional funds remaining in trust. The transaction, slated to close before the end of September following shareholder and regulatory approvals, gives NorthStar a pre-money valuation of $300 million. NorthStar plans to use the funding to expand a network of space-based sensors for tracking other space objects, although the company has struggled to deploy satellites, challenges that have included legal action against satellite manufacturer Spire. [SpaceNews] NASA has selected SpaceX to launch a European Mars rover despite seeking to cancel funding for the mission in its budget. NASA announced last week it awarded SpaceX a contract to launch ESA's Rosalind Franklin rover on a Falcon Heavy in late 2028. The contract is worth $175.7 million. NASA is providing the launch because it also agreed to offer radioisotope heating units and braking thrusters to ESA for the mission to compensate for capabilities lost when ESA canceled cooperation with Roscosmos on the mission in 2022. However, NASA's fiscal year 2027 budget includes no funding for its contributions to Rosalind Franklin, one of more than 50 science missions proposed for cancellation in the budget. [SpaceNews] Rhea Space Activity has raised $6 million to advance navigation software designed to operate without GPS. The company raised the Series A round from several funds to accelerate development of navigation software that can guide spacecraft in environments where GPS signals are unavailable, including during atmospheric reentry or in deep space. The company said the system, called AutoNav, will be tested on a reentry capsule developed by Varda Space Industries that launched last month. [SpaceNews] Other News A Falcon 9 launched more Starlink satellites Sunday. The rocket lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 12:03 p.m. Eastern, putting 25 Starlink satellites into orbit. The launch featured the 600th landing of a Falcon booster. [Spaceflight Now] A Soyuz rocket launched a Russian military payload. The Soyuz-2.1b rocket lifted off from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome Thursday at 7:17 p.m. Eastern carrying a classified mission for the Russian Ministry of Defense. By Saturday, the U.S. Space Force had tracked 10 objects from the launch in two sets of inclinations, suggesting a plane-change maneuver by the rocket's Volga upper stage during the flight. [RussianSpaceWeb.com] Chinese astronauts currently on the Tiangong space station will spend an extra month there. The three astronauts, who arrived at the station in late October on the Shenzhou-21 spacecraft for a six-month stay, will now return by late May. That is linked to a switch in spacecraft for their return: Shenzhou-21 was used by the astronauts who arrived on Shenzhou-20 after that spacecraft suffered damage from a micrometeoroid or orbital debris impact. China launched the uncrewed Shenzhou-22 spacecraft in late November that will be used by the current crew. [SpaceNews] The crew of the Artemis 2 mission said they were confident the Orion spacecraft is ready to support future missions. At a press conference last week, astronauts praised the performance of Orion on the nine-day mission, including its handling, despite minor issues such as leaking valves. That performance, they said, showed the spacecraft was ready for future missions, including those supporting lunar landing attempts. [SpaceNews] Rocket Lab has completed its acquisition of optical intersatellite terminal company Mynaric. The company announced last week it closed the deal, announced last year, to acquire Mynaric for $155.3 million in cash and stock. German regulators approved the transaction last month after an extensive review. Mynaric will continue to operate in Germany and serve as Rocket Lab's first European entity, giving the company access to space programs across Europe. [Rocket Lab] NASA has turned off an instrument on Voyager 1 as that spacecraft's power levels decline. NASA announced Friday it turned off the Low-energy Charged Particles (LECP) experiment to conserve power after an unexpected dip in power readings on the spacecraft in late February during a routine maneuver. The version of LECP on Voyager 2 was turned off last year. The two Voyager spacecraft use radioisotope thermoelectric generators to produce power, and those power levels are dropping as the plutonium in them decays. NASA also announced Friday it turned off the Burst Alert Telescope instrument on its Swift gamma-ray observatory spacecraft to conserve power as that spacecraft's low Earth orbit decays. NASA is modifying operations of the spacecraft to reduce drag, buying time for the launch of a reboost mission being developed by Katalyst Space slated for as soon as June. [NASA] FROM SPACENEWS Reach the United States' largest gathering of GEOINT professionals: For the first time, SpaceNews will produce show daily editions during the GEOINT Symposium 2026 from May 3 to 6 in Aurora, Co. Deliver your message directly to industry leaders, extending your event investment for maximum impact. Book your ad, press release or sponsored today. Start a conversation with our team. The Week Ahead Monday: Online: Sen. Deb Fisher (R-Neb.), chair of the Senate Armed Forces Committee's strategic forces subcommittee, speaks at a CSIS event at 9:45 a.m. Eastern. Online: The Outer Planets Assessment Group meets for a discussion with NASA planetary science leadership at 12:30 p.m. Eastern. Online: The National Academies' Committee on Solar and Space Physics holds a followup meeting with NASA at 3 p.m. Eastern. Monday-Thursday: Libreville, Gabon: The NewSpace Africa Conference by Space in Africa and the African Space Agency discusses space business and policy issues in Africa. Montecatini, Italy: The International Academy of Astronautics holds the Humans in Space 2026 conference. Tuesday: Cape Canaveral, Fla.: Scheduled launch of a Falcon 9 carrying the GPS 3 SV10 spacecraft at 2:53 a.m. Eastern. Washington/Online: CSIS hosts "Space Strategic Dialogue: Space and the Future of Warfare" with the head of U.S. Space Command, Gen. Stephen Whiting at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. Online: Northrop Grumman releases its first quarter financial results and holds an earnings call at 9:30 a.m. Eastern. Online: The Schriever Spacepower Series holds a webinar on the Space Force's Operational Test and Training Infrastructure at 10:30 a.m. Eastern. Washington: The House Energy and Commerce Committee's communications and technology committee holds a hearing on "SAT Streamlining Act: Modernizing Satellite Licensing for the Final Frontier" at 2 p.m. Eastern. Wallops Island, Va.: Projected launch of a Rocket Lab HASTE suborbital rocket at 8 p.m. Eastern. Tuesday-Thursday: Baltimore/Online: The Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group meets for information on current and future Mars missions. Wednesday: Online: Lockheed Martin releases its first quarter financial results and holds an earnings call at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. Washington: The House Science Committee holds a hearing on the administration's fiscal year 2027 budget proposal for NASA at 10 a.m. Eastern. Washington: The Senate Appropriations Committee's commerce, justice and science subcommittee holds a hearing on the administration's fiscal year 2027 budget proposal for the Dept. of Commerce at 10 a.m. Eastern. Washington: Nicola Fox, NASA associate administrator for science, speaks at a Washington Space Business Roundtable luncheon at 11:30 a.m. Eastern. Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif.: Scheduled launch of a Falcon 9 carrying Starlink satellites at 10 p.m. Eastern. Mahia Peninsula, N.Z.: Scheduled launch of an Electron carrying a set of JAXA-sponsored smallsats at 11:09 p.m. Eastern. Wednesday-Thursday: Online: The Lunar Surface Science Workshop hosts the webinar "Results from Early CLPS Deliveries and Upcoming CLPS Exploration Activities."  Thursday: Online: GSOA holds a webinar on "Direct-to-Device & NTN Commercialisation: Scaling Satellite Services in 2026 and Beyond" at 10 a.m. Eastern. Online: Boeing releases its first quarter financial results and holds an earnings call at 10:30 a.m. Eastern. Washington: The House Appropriations Committee's commerce, justice and science subcommittee holds a hearing on the administration's fiscal year 2027 budget proposal for the Dept. of Commerce at 11 a.m. Eastern. Friday: Xichang, China: Anticipated launch of a Long March 3B with an undisclosed payload. Saturday: Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif.: Scheduled launch of a Falcon 9 carrying Starlink satellites at 10 a.m. Eastern. Baikonur, Kazakhstan: Scheduled launch of a Soyuz-2.1a rocket with the Progress MS-34 cargo spacecraft for the International Space Station at 6:21 p.m. Eastern 📨 Don't miss what's next. Sign up for other SpaceNews newsletters: Europe Report: Tracking the policy landscape, investment climate and regional priorities driving Europe’s space ambitions. Military Space: Veteran defense journalist Sandra Erwin with weekly news and insights for the military space professional. China Report: Biweekly news and analysis from correspondent Andrew Jones on business, politics and technology in the Chinese space industry. SpaceNext AI: Exploring the intersection of space and artificial intelligence. SpaceNews Mission Brief: Golden Dome: Explaining the Golden Dome initiative and what it means for the space industry. Marketing Minute: Covering PR, marketing and advertising trends for industry communications leaders.  Editor’s Choice: Our most important recent stories you may have missed, with background and insights from editors, reporters and contributors. Opinions: A weekly digest of the latest commentary and analysis. SpaceNews This Week: The week’s top headlines and our conference coverage. Subscribe to SpaceNews This email has been sent to generalastronomy110.stnirp@blogger.com because you previously opted in to receive First Up from SpaceNews. Unsubscribe here. Sign up for other SpaceNews newsletters.  SpaceNews.com  |  Advertise with SpaceNews Contact us  |  Privacy policy  |  Terms and conditions SpaceNews.com  |  Advertise with SpaceNews  |  Contact us  |  Privacy policy  |  Terms and conditions © 2026, SpaceNews, 100 Fillmore Street, 5th Floor, Denver, CO 80206, United States