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Commercial space station developers have varying degrees of optimism that crew access to their stations will be possible once SpaceX retires Crew Dragon. During a panel discussion at the International Astronautical Congress this week, executives from companies working on commercial space stations, such as Starlab Space and Vast, said they expect NASA to ensure there is crewed access through vehicles like Starliner, noting the importance of human spaceflight to low Earth orbit extends beyond their stations. However, Axiom Space expressed concern, noting their planning has focused on Crew Dragon with no alternative options. Blue Origin has been working on designs for its own crewed vehicle, but a company executive said on the panel it does not plan to fund work on it internally, noting the need to work with NASA to ensure it meets agency certification requirements. [SpaceNews]
The U.S. Space Force is looking for new ways to track emerging technologies and the flow of private capital. The service's innovation arm, SpaceWERX, selected startup USAX for a $1.49 million Direct-to-Phase 2 Small Business Innovation Research contract to develop its Provenance Engine, aimed at giving decision makers a clearer picture of technology development, investment activity and opportunities for government and private-sector collaboration. The platform combines information from multiple sources into a common analytical framework, then applies weighting and scoring to help decision makers assess financial relationships and investment exposure. [SpaceNews]
Blue Origin is expanding in Texas as the company's founder says it is on a path to going public. The company announced Thursday it will build a manufacturing complex called Constellation Park in central Texas, spanning 120,000 square meters. The facility, with an estimated cost of more than $550 million, will be used to support production for TeraWave, the company's broadband constellation, and its Quartz network of ground stations. The announcement came a day after Jeff Bezos said in an interview that he opened up Blue Origin to outside investment for the first time in a new $10 billion round because he sees "the financial future of Blue with some clarity now." He added that he expects Blue Origin to go public someday, although he said that could be in several years. [SpaceNews]
Earth observation company Planet is moving to address growing sovereign demand. The company recently opened a satellite production line in Berlin to support European customers and announced a series of deals with European and Japanese customers. As Planet addresses increasing defense and intelligence demands, company leaders are developing tools to pair the extensive Earth observation data provided by their fleet of 150 to 200 satellites in low Earth orbit with the analytical power of artificial intelligence for commercial and civil applications. [SpaceNews]
BlackSky, another Earth observation company, announced Thursday a contract with an unnamed international intelligence agency. The contract, which the company said only was in the six figures, covers delivery of global on-demand high-resolution imagery for what the company called a sovereign partner in a "critical strategic region." BlackSky's international business is growing rapidly as countries look for ways to ensure sovereign access to Earth-observation imagery and data. [SpaceNews]
Lithuanian startup Astrolight has successfully commissioned a space-to-ground laser communication link. Its ATLAS-1 laser communication terminal aboard ERMIS-3, an 8U cubesat led by the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, successfully connected with an optical ground station in Greece. This was the first time Astrolight has delivered a space-to-ground laser communication link to a customer and is also the first in-orbit operation of Astrolight's ATLAS-1 laser terminal. ATLAS-1 currently transmits data at 1 gigabit per second (Gbps), but Astrolight says link budget margins show that the system could support rates of up to 10 Gbps. [SpaceNews]
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