Charles Beames joins TrustPoint as executive chairman. Photo: PR Newswire

Satellite navigation startup TrustPoint has appointed Charles Beames as executive chairman of the company’s board of directors. With this role, Beames will lead the TrustPoint board and work with the company’s executive team. 

TrustPoint, which recently won the Startup Space competition at SATELLITE, is developing a fully commercial Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) to provide greater accuracy, security, and availability for government and commercial GPS users.

Beames has more than three decades of aerospace and investment, including as president of Vulcan Aerospace and principal director of Space & Intelligence Systems in the Pentagon. He is chairman of the industry group SmallSat Alliance and also the executive chairman of both York Space Systems and SpiderOak. 

“TrustPoint began with an entirely new ‘clean sheet’ approach that leverages commoditized space hardware and a unique service frequency to avoid the high capital and protracted regulatory battles that have too often hobbled the sector over the years,” Beames said in a news release. “This approach avoids the obsolescence of other proposed concepts while focusing on cutting edge GNSS products and services that are robust, secure, and reliable for the new era.”

Hear from TrustPoint CEO Patrick Shannon in a recent episode of the On Orbit podcast