Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Spy satellite agency embracing a hybrid approach • Space Force on-ramping small launch providers

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National security insights for space professionals. Delivered Tuesdays.

In this week's edition:

• The nation's spy satellite agency embracing a hybrid approach

• Space Force on-ramping small launch providers for IDIQ contract

• Maxar's Worldview Legion satellites finally arrive at the launch site

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Today's highlights:

The SATELLITE 2024 conference kicked off on Monday at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C., with hundreds of attendees from across the globe.

In a keynote speech, Troy Meink, principal deputy director of the National Reconnaissance Office, said the NRO has changed its procurement methods to take advantage of small satellite technologies and lower launch costs.

But, he added, the agency is embracing a hybrid approach, pursuing a mix of traditional big birds and smallsats.
"Our main priority is to meet the requirements with minimum risk," he said. "Physics gets a vote. We can't do everything with proliferated LEO."

The NRO's upcoming launch campaign reflects this two-track strategy:

A small NRO sat dubbed NROL-123 is set to hitch a ride to LEO aboard a Rocket Lab Electron small launch vehicle from the company's new Wallops, Virginia, pad during a window opening March 21. It'll be Rocket Lab's first NRO launch from U.S. soil.
One of the NRO's largest-ever satellites, NROL-70, is scheduled to go up on a United Launch Alliance Delta 4 Heavy from Cape Canaveral on March 28 — the swan song for ULA's Delta program.

GEOSTATIONARY SATELLITES STILL IN DEMAND Manufacturers of large, traditional geostationary communications satellites insist demand for their products is not going away thanks to technological advances and interest in multi-orbit solutions.

During a panel at SATELLITE 2024 executives with several manufacturers acknowledged demand for their satellites had dropped significantly from historical levels of 20 to 25 orders a year but that the market itself was not dying.

"GEO's not dead," said Chris Johnson, chief executive of Maxar Space Systems. "By no means is it dead, but it has evolved."

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SPACE FORCE IS ON-RAMPING launch providers for the OSP-4 small-payload launch services contract.

In a solicitation posted last week for the Orbital Services Program Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract, the U.S. Space Force's Small Launch and Targets Division announced a new opportunity to compete for contracts worth up to $986 million through October 2028.

Proposals are due April 15.
OSP-4 procures launch services for payloads 400 pounds or greater, and have to be executed within 12-24 months from task order award.
There are currently 10 launch providers on the contract: ABL Space Systems, Aevum, Astra, Firefly Aerospace, Northrop Grumman, Relativity Space, Rocket Lab, SpaceX, United Launch Alliance and X-Bow.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced on Monday it awarded a $15.5 million contract to Parsons Corp. of Chantilly, Virginia, for system integration and cloud management services for the Traffic Coordination System for Space (TraCSS).

NOAA's Office of Space Commerce is developing TraCSS as a cloud-based IT system that will provide basic space situational awareness and space traffic coordination services to private and civil space operators.

As the system integrator, Parsons will develop the software backbone for the operational TraCSS platform, including the SSA data repository and the application layer.
The company will integrate third-party software components from commercial companies into TraCSS.
Parsons also will be responsible for management of cloud services, cybersecurity protection and system administration for TraCSS operations.

In other news 🚀

Maxar Technologies is finally on the home stretch to launching the first two satellites of its next-generation WorldView Legion Earth-imaging constellation.

The first two of six planned high-resolution WorldView Legion satellites have arrived at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, paving the way for liftoff as soon as April aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

This marks a crucial milestone for the WorldView Legion program, which has suffered repeated setbacks since Maxar started developing the spacecraft in 2017.

Terran Orbital announced plans to produce a new line of small satellite buses designed to operate in geostationary Earth orbit.

The company said it will compete in the so-called small GEO satellite market with a new bus named SmallSat GEO.

Small GEO satellites are an emerging class of spacecraft designed for geostationary orbit.

Sierra Space is aiming to capture a larger share of the national security market in new sectors like in-orbit services and transportation.

The company is developing orbital vehicles using technologies from its civil and commercial roots in militarized configurations to support defense operations.

Sierra Space has a $1.3 billion defense backlog that includes a $740 million deal announced in January to produce 18 missile-tracking satellites for the U.S. Space Force's next-generation missile-tracking satellite network built by the Space Development Agency.

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