Government/Military

The U.S. Air Force’s second new GPS III satellite has arrived in Florida for launch. According to the release, GPS III is the most powerful and resilient GPS satellite ever put on orbit. Developed with an entirely new design, for U.S. and allied forces, it aims to have three times greater accuracy and up to eight...

SpaceX has promised to redesign its upcoming mega-constellation of internet satellites so that they cannot hurt anyone on Earth. In a meeting with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) last week, SpaceX said that the vast majority of its Starlink satellites will no longer contain dense metallic components that could have survived re-entry and endangered people...

Orbit Communication Systems and Inmarsat Government announced a long-term agreement to offer end-users a new modular, multi-role aviation terminal, optimized for use over Inmarsat’s Global Xpress (GX) network. The new terminal will operate over Inmarsat’s GX constellation, a globally available, high-throughput wideband network. It aims to deliver Inmarsat’s ‘Satcom as a Service,’ featuring commercial Ka-band and...

Fifty years after the first moon landing, an American triumph that gripped the world, China marked the start of 2019 with its own lunar achievement. Chang’e-4, a Chinese probe, landed on the far side of the moon in early January, broadcasting — for the first time in human history — images of the cratered surface...

Defense officials want to test a neutral particle-beam in orbit in fiscal 2023 as part of a ramped-up effort to explore various types of space-based weaponry. They’ve asked for $304 million in the 2020 budget to develop such beams, more powerful lasers, and other new tech for next-generation missile defense. Such weapons are needed, they say, to...

A United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta IV rocket carrying the WGS-10 satellite for the U.S. Air Force successfully lifted off from Space Launch Complex-37 on March 15 at 8:26 p.m. EDT. According to the release, ULA has been the exclusive launch provider for all 10 Wideband Global Satcom (WGS) satellites. The WGS-10 satellite, built by Boeing, is...

Viasat recently revealed that its KOR-24A Small Tactical Terminal (STT) was selected by the Canadian Department of National Defense in Sept. 2018 to support its Army’s Airspace Coordination Center Modernization (ASCCM) project. According to the release, Viasat’s STT is the world’s only multi-channel, software-upgradable radio capable of performing Link 16 communications in a small form...

Cubic acquired Nuvotronics, a technology provider of micro-fabricated Radio Frequency (RF) products, for approximately $64 million in cash. This is subject to customary adjustments, with additional earn-out payments of up to $8 million based on future performance. The cornerstone of Nuvotronics’ innovation platform is their patented PolyStrata technology, which was developed under the Defense Advanced Research...

Raytheon was awarded a $7.6 million modification to a previously awarded firm-fixed-price contract (N00039-16-C-0050) from the U.S. Navy. The contract is for the production, testing, and delivery of fully integrated Navy Multiband Terminals (NMT). NMT is a multiband capable satellite communications terminal that provides protected and wideband communications. NMT supports Extremely High Frequency (EHF)/Advanced EHF...

The community served by Via Satellite has a history of innovation, with decades of proven performance in delivering capabilities from space. Businesses and individual consumers now leverage space solutions that are so integrated into our way of life, that we have grown dependent on them. New threats are arising to the use of space. China,...