Government/Military

Blue Canyon Technologies (BCT) was selected by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) to support a combined initiative between the U.S. Department of the Navy and the U.K. Ministry of Defense for a demonstration mission called CIRCE. The mission is scheduled to launch in March of 2020. CIRCE, which stands for Coordinated Ionospheric Reconstruction CubeSat...

The C-Band Alliance (CBA) revealed that it will commit to clear 300 Megahertz (MHz) of C-band spectrum to support fast 5G wireless deployment throughout the continental U.S. In an updated filing with the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the CBA detailed that the 300 MHz of spectrum includes a 20-MHz guard band to protect existing...

The 2019 World Radiocommunications Conference (WRC) kicks off next week. More than 300 delegates from all countries across the world are gathering in Egypt to update the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) Radio Regulations to enable the most advanced radio-based communications services to be deployed on the ground and in space. Held every three to four...

Nanoracks signed an agreement with Canada’s Maritime Launch Services to work on re-purposing and re-using spent C4M upper rocket vehicle stages, which would be in-orbit after launch missions from Nova Scotia’s Canso Spaceport, Canada’s first and only commercial spaceport. In 2018, Nanoracks was one of the awardees of a study contract by NASA to develop...

The GPS III Contingency Operations Program (COps) successfully connected with the first GPS III satellite on orbit. The COps system will allow the U.S. Air Force to operationally command and control the new GPS III satellites as well as legacy GPS satellites currently in the constellation. This month, the COps program received approval from Air...

Maxar Technologies signed a joint statement of strategic intent and cooperation with the Australian Space Agency. Under the statement, Maxar and Australian Space Agency will investigate collaboration in areas of mutual strategic interest related to Earth intelligence and space infrastructure capabilities, and space-related Australian education and training initiatives. These projects may include development of next-generation...

Blue Origin revealed a national team to offer a Human Landing System for NASA’s Artemis program to return Americans to the lunar surface by 2024. Blue Origin signed teaming agreements with Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and Draper. These partners have decades of experience supporting NASA with human space flight systems, launch vehicles, orbital logistics, deep-space...

Sandia National Laboratories aims to play a key role in satellite cyber protection. The organization has announced a new seven-year mission campaign to develop the science, technology and architecture needed for autonomous satellite protection systems. The campaign, called STARCS (Science and Technology Advancing Resilience for Contested Space), will fund dozens of Laboratory Directed Research and Development...

On the first ever all-female spacewalk, NASA astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir ventured outside the International Space Station (ISS) today at 7:38 a.m. EDT, to replace faulty equipment on the station’s exterior. The astronauts replaced a faulty battery charge/discharge unit (BCDU) that failed to activate following the Oct. 11 installation of new lithium-ion batteries...

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) gave Swarm Technologies approval to launch 150 satellites. According to the FCC document, Swarm will be able to “construct, deploy, and operate a constellation of 150 technically identical non-voice, non-geostationary (NVNG) satellites in the low earth orbit (LEO) for the provision of mobile-satellite services (MSS).” Additionally, each satellite will have an...