Plus: U.S. space agency employees offered federal buyouts
| | | A SpaceNews daily newsletter | | 02/07/2025 | | | | | Sensor company Geost is suing Sierra Space over a contract to provide payloads for a set of missile-warning satellites. The lawsuit, filed last month, accuses Sierra Space of engaging in subcontracting negotiations and encouraging Geost to pre-purchase materials, only to later abandon the deal in favor of a competing supplier, Leidos. Sierra Space won a $740 million contract last January to produce 18 satellites for the SDA's Tranche 2 Tracking Layer. Geost says that the companies initially agreed to work together when Sierra Space submitted its bid, and spent $2 million to purchase components, but Sierra Space subsequently delayed finalizing the subcontract with Geost while secretly negotiating with Leidos. Sierra Space said it disputed the claims. [SpaceNews]
A government employee buyout proposal spearheaded by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has reached the space intelligence community. The so-called "Fork in the Road" memo offered federal employees the option to resign while retaining full pay and benefits through the end of September. The memo went to most of the federal workforce but initially excluded positions related to national security and public safety. However, the buyout program was nonetheless extended to civilian employees in agencies with critical space-related missions, officials with such agencies, including the NRO and NGA, confirmed. The deadline for the buyout was Thursday but a federal judge paused the effort in response to legal challenges from federal workforce unions. [SpaceNews]
Elon Musk's role in DOGE has prompted concerns from Congress about conflicts of interest. In one letter Thursday to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, cited a social media post by Duffy that DOGE would "plug in" to upgrade FAA aviation systems. Cantwell noted that Musk is CEO of SpaceX, whose launches are licensed by the FAA and who has criticized the agency, including for fines last year for license violations. In a separate letter, Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Valerie Foushee (D-N.C.), ranking members of the House Science Committee and its space subcommittee, asked NASA's acting administrator for details about any work DOGE may be doing at the space agency. They cited concerns that DOGE's work could give Musk access to proprietary information from SpaceX competitors who have NASA contracts. [SpaceNews]
A Defense Department unit is examining how SpaceX's Starship vehicle could be used to support a broader architecture of in-space refueling. In a talk at the Smallsat Symposium Thursday, Gary Henry, a senior adviser at the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) and a former SpaceX executive, said DIU and SpaceX were looking at how Starship could advance a broader infrastructure for in-space refueling, leveraging the propellant transfer capabilities that Starship requires for missions beyond low Earth orbit. DIU is also examining how Starship could support "novel responsive space delivery" by bringing cargo from orbit back to the Earth. [SpaceNews]
Chinese low Earth orbit megaconstellation operator Spacesail has signed an agreement with Measat to expand its presence into Southeast Asia. The companies announced the agreement Thursday that will involve access to Spacesail's Thousand Sails, or Qianfan, megaconstellation for broadband, direct-to-device and Internet-of-Things services. Measat plans to combine Spacesail with its own geostationary communications satellites to create multi-orbit satellite networks to expand digital connectivity, especially in remote areas. [SpaceNews]
| | | | | Investors are worried that satellite operators Eutelsat and SES may default on their debt. The cost of credit default swaps, a financial derivative that serves as a kind of insurance if companies default on debt, has grown significantly in the last year for the two operators. Those costs translate into a 65% chance Eutelsat will default on its nearly two billion euros in debt and 22% for SES's five billion euros in debt. Rating firms have cited problems the companies are facing responding to competition from SpaceX's Starlink as reasons for the growing risks of default. [Financial Times]
Urban Sky, a startup developing stratospheric balloons for applications that compete with satellites, has raised $30 million. The company announced the Series B round Thursday led by Altos Ventures with several returning investors also participating. The company will use the funds to scale up its business flying small balloons into the stratosphere with imaging, communications and other payloads. They can provide imagery at lower costs and higher resolution than satellites, and can provide persistence by hovering over an area for hours or days. The company says the Defense Department has been particularly interested in the capability, calling the balloons "personally deployable satellites." [SpaceNews]
The space industry could take lessons from its aviation and maritime counterparts to improve orbital safety. A panel at the Smallsat Symposium Thursday advocated for space rules of the road like those that existing in sea and air travel. They also recommended the use of beacons on satellites to provide precision positions, citing the use of similar transponders on planes and ships. Automation may also be required to address the growing number of satellites and other objects in orbit. [SpaceNews]
NASA and SpaceX will likely swap Dragon spacecraft to avoid further delays in the launch of a new crew to the International Space Station. That plan, yet to be formally announced by NASA, would use the Dragon spacecraft that had been assigned for the Ax-4 private astronaut mission by Axiom Space this spring for NASA's Crew-10 mission. Crew-10 was initially assigned to use a new Crew Dragon capsule, but delays in its assembly and testing had already pushed back the launch from February to late March, with the risk of additional slips. The swap would allow Crew-10 to launch in mid-March but would delay Ax-4 to later in the spring. [Ars Technica]
Technical problems have delayed the undocking of a pair of Indian technology demonstration satellites. The two Space Docking Experiment, or SpaDEx, satellites successfully docked to each other in orbit last month in a first for India's space program. The satellites had been expected to undock a short time later to continue tests, but the spacecraft are still docked and may remain so until March or April, an official with the Indian space agency ISRO said, citing unspecified technical issues with the spacecraft. That is impeding the ability of the satellites to carry out other aspects of their missions, including testing of Earth observation and radiation sensors. [The New Indian Express]
| | | | | | | | | "Everybody knows that Elon's number one at SpaceX, but somehow I ended up number one in payroll."
– Tom Mueller, founder and CEO of Impulse Space, explaining how he became known as employee number one at SpaceX in 2002 during a fireside chat at the Smallsat Symposium.
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