12/11/2025

The 2025 Icon Awards: Meet the people, programs and technologies that have most influenced the direction of the space industry in the past year. See the winners.

Top Stories

Blue Origin is seeking certification of its New Glenn rocket for national security missions after four launches. Space Force Lt. Gen. Philip Garrant, head of Space Systems Command, said Wednesday Blue Origin selected the four-flight benchmark and the government agreed. Blue Origin has performed two New Glenn launches to date and Garrant said the next launch is expected "earlier in the new year than later." The numbers of launches needed for national security certification varies based on design maturity, test history and the government's risk tolerance. Once certified, Blue Origin would join SpaceX and United Launch Alliance as the Space Force's third heavy-lift launch provider. [SpaceNews]

Refueling of GEO satellites is one of the most practical and immediately valuable applications of on-orbit servicing, according to a new report. The study by the Consortium for Space Mobility and ISAM Capabilities, or COSMIC, a NASA-established group, argues that GEO refueling has become a national security need as military and intelligence spacecraft face rising maneuver demands and fixed fuel reserves. Key technologies needed for GEO satellite refueling exist, COSMIC concluded, and recommended focused investment, early demonstrations and coordinated policy work to bring the capability into routine use. [SpaceNews]

The search for past or present life on Mars should be the top priority of future human missions there. A study by the National Academies released this week identified 11 science priorities for Mars missions, ranging from the search for life to characterizing resources for future missions and assessing the effects of the Martian environment on crew health. The 11 priorities came from hundreds considered by the study. The report also identified four potential campaigns of missions to carry out those objectives involving a mix of short- and long-duration stays on the Martian surface. The report emphasized it was focused on what humans should do on Mars and not how they should get there, saying questions of technical approaches and their costs and schedules should be assessed later. [SpaceNews]

Voyager Technologies won a contract to develop AI-enabled signals processing tools. The $21 million Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) contract, announced Wednesday, enters on software and computing techniques that can interpret raw intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance data collected by sensors. AFRL is investing in technologies that can push more processing to the "edge," a term for computing performed on board a satellite, aircraft or other deployed system rather than at a distant ground station. [SpaceNews]

L3Harris received approval to sell a satellite-jamming system to U.S. allies. The system, known as Meadowlands, has been added to the list of technologies eligible for sale through the U.S. government's Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program, allowing it to be sold to America's closest intelligence partners, such as the Five Eyes nations. Meadowlands is designed to detect, identify, disrupt or jam adversary satellite communications, a capability the Space Force classifies as a counter-space function intended to deny an opponent the use of key space assets such as communications or intelligence satellites. [SpaceNews]

Two defense technology companies from Norway and Germany have joined forces to bolster Europe's sovereign intelligence and communications capabilities. Germany's Helsing and Norway's Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace (KDA) said they will work together on a "substantial number" of LEO satellites for collecting intelligence data along with communications and space situational awareness. German defense firm Hensoldt plans to provide sensors for the effort, and German launch startup Isar Aerospace would launch the satellites. The companies declined to disclose financial details, including funding plans or any customer commitments. [SpaceNews]

More than two dozen space companies are among those joining a NATO accelerator program. NATO selected 150 companies from 24 of its member countries to join its Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic (DIANA), each receiving 100,000 euros ($117,000) and access to more than 200 test centers to develop their dual-use defense and commercial technologies. The program includes "Resilient Space Operations" as one area of interest, and picked 15 companies in this area; multiple space-related firms appear in other categories. [SpaceNews]

Other News

SpaceX launched another set of Starlink satellites early Wednesday. A Falcon 9 lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 3:40 a.m. Eastern and placed 27 Starlink satellites into orbit. The launch was the 160th flight of a Falcon 9 so far this year. [Spaceflight Now]

Rocket Lab scrubbed the launch of a South Korean imaging satellite late Wednesday. Rocket Lab called off the launch Wednesday evening (U.S. time) saying it needed to assess sensor data from the vehicle. The company did not immediately announce a new launch date. Rocket Lab announced the launch, carrying an imaging satellite for the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, just Tuesday, moving ahead of a launch for the Japanese space agency JAXA. [ChosunBiz]

Blue Origin is among the companies interested in orbital data centers. The company has reportedly been investing the technology for AI data centers in orbit for more than a year, although the company declined to comment on any efforts there. Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos said in October he believed data centers would eventually move to orbit, a process that he said might take 20 years. Data centers in orbit offer the promise of using solar power, but face various technical challenges, including radiating excess heat and protection from radiation. [Wall Street Journal]

British startup Odin Space raised $3 million in a seed round to begin commercializing space debris sensors. The company has developed sensors to map and analyze sub-centimeter orbital debris, which is too small to reliably track from the ground but can still damage spacecraft. Odin tested its first sensor as a hosted payload on a D-Orbit ION spacecraft in 2023 and plans to start flying the first commercial version of that sensor in 2026. With data gathered by its network of sensors, Odin plans to map the location of sub-centimeter debris and help customers select the safest orbits. [SpaceNews]

Collisions of small orbital debris particles could also create radio emissions that can be detected on the ground. The research found that small debris objects can emit electromagnetic signals when colliding with one another at high speeds. Researchers say that could be used to remotely detect, characterize and track currently non-trackable orbital space debris from the ground or from orbit, including debris currently too small to detect by other means. [SpaceNews]

Benchmark Space Systems has tested a thruster using a green propellant in a long-duration test. The company's Macaw thruster fired for 10 minutes in the test conducted in cooperation with the AFRL Aerospace Systems Directorate. The thruster uses ASCENT, a non-toxic propellant with greater performance than other monopropellants, and produces 22 newtons of thrust. Benchmark is now preparing to qualify Macaw for on-orbit demonstration missions. [SpaceNews]

Israel signed an agreement with NASA on space cooperation. The 10-year agreement, signed Wednesday at NASA Headquarters, covers cooperation on the Artemis lunar exploration campaign as well as experiments on the International Space Station and Ultrasat, a joint astrophysics satellite mission. Gila Gamliel, Israel's science and technology minister, said the agreement was a key part of the country's "next national vision in space" that includes flying the country's first female astronaut. [Jerusalem Post]

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FROM SPACENEWS

Meet the 2025 Icon Award Winners: This year's recipients range from a company that successfully landed on the moon to an agency leader who transformed NASA's relationship with industry, making room for commercial lunar landers in the first place. On Tuesday, Dec. 2 in Washington D.C., we awarded this year's Icon Awards during a program at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center. Learn more about what made this year's class stand out.

Losing Sleep Over Dark Energy

"The more we learn about this stuff, the less we understand it, and the more sleep I want to lose, because it tells me there's something fundamental about this very universe we are talking in that the brightest minds in the world can't explain."

– Shawn Domagal-Goldman, acting director of NASA's astrophysics division, talking about dark energy at a Maryland Space Business Roundtable speech Wednesday.

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