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Terran Orbital says it has received a long-awaited payment from Rivada Space Networks for manufacturing its satellite constellation. Terran Orbital announced Tuesday that it received the past-due payment and that Rivada had now paid all outstanding invoices to date, but did not disclose the size of the payment. Terran Orbital had told shareholders in October it expected to get a $180 million payment from its biggest customer before the end of 2023. The company separately announced Tuesday it expects to report more than $70 million in cash as of Dec. 31, $31 million more than three months earlier, following what it said were key customer payments at year-end. Terran Orbital won a contract last year to build the 576-satellite constellation, half of which must be in orbit by mid-2026 to meet regulatory deadlines. [SpaceNews]
SpaceX launched its first set of Starlink satellites with direct-to-device capabilities Tuesday night. A Falcon 9 lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 10:44 p.m. Eastern and deployed 21 Starlink satellites into orbit. Six of those satellites are equipped with payloads to provide 4G LTE connectivity to mobile devices. SpaceX plans to start enabling texting from space this year in partnership with cellular operators, with voice and data connectivity coming in 2025, although the company still needs regulatory permission to provide the services commercially. [SpaceNews]
The commercial arm of Indian space agency ISRO will launch a communications satellite later this year on a Falcon 9. New Space India Ltd. (NSIL) announced Tuesday it signed a contract with SpaceX for the launch of the GSAT-20 communications satellite on a Falcon 9 in the second quarter. The satellite, which will provide Ka-band high-throughput services in India, was originally expected to launch on an Indian rocket, the LVM3. NSIL did not disclose the reason for the change but the stated mass of GSAT-20, 4,700 kilograms, now exceeds the capacity of LVM3. India had previously used Arianespace for launching large communications satellites, but the new Ariane 6 rocket will not be ready in time to launch GSAT-20. [SpaceNews]
An Indian telecom operator has denied rumors SpaceX was buying part of it. Shares of Vodaphone Idea had surged on the Bombay Stock Exchange in recent days after rumors that SpaceX was planning to take a stake in the company as a means to gain entry into the Indian market for Starlink. Vodaphone Idea informed the exchange Tuesday that it was not in talks with SpaceX, and shares subsequently fell. [Reuters]
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A startup is selling digital payloads on a lunar lander mission. Copernic Space is flying a payload housed in a capsule from San Francisco startup LifeShip that will be on Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost 1 lander mission, scheduled to launch later this year. Digital assets being sent in the Copernic Space lunar payload include music, code, fine art collections, company registrations and videos. Copernic Space describes this as the latest step in its efforts to create a digital marketplace for selling and financing space assets. [SpaceNews]
NASA's Juno spacecraft returned stunning images of Jupiter's moon Io after a recent flyby. Juno passed 1,500 kilometers from the volcanic moon on Saturday, its closest approach to date. The spacecraft returned detailed images of the moon as part of measurements of Io's volcanic activity. Juno will make another close flyby of Io in February. [Space.com]
The space shuttle Endeavour is going under wraps as it prepares for a new exhibit. Endeavour had been on public display at the California Science Center in Los Angeles for more than a decade in a horizontal configuration. That exhibit closed to the public on Sunday as the museum prepares to mate the shuttle to an external tank and two solid rocket boosters, displaying it vertically on a simulated launch pad. That process will take a couple of years. During that work, Endeavour will literally be shrink-wrapped to keep it from getting dirty during the construction of the new exhibit. [collectSPACE]
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www.YorkSpaceSystems.com, Careers | | Planet Litter Box
"I think it would be Mars. Just anything with dirt and sand for obvious reasons. I think an entire planet being a litter box would be a dream for him. Cats also love really bad smells. So, he would probably do well on Venus. Or somewhere where there's just a ton of methane. If there's dirt and methane, Taters would probably be in heaven."
– Joby Harris, a visual strategist at JPL when asked about the favorite planet of Taters, his cat. Taters became famous last month for appearing in a video used to test a laser communications system on the Psyche spacecraft. [Astronomy]
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