News

Date: July 19, 2022 | Outlet: The Washington Post | By: Karoun Demirjian The Pentagon this week said it reached important new milestones as it scrambles to catch up with China and Russia in what has become a fraught arms race between the world’s most advanced militaries, conductinga successful hypersonic missile test and securing a…

Date: July 18, 2022 | Outlet: Associated Press | By: Lolita C. Baldor WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. will spend $1.3 billion to develop advanced satellites that will be able to better track hypersonic missile threats, the Pentagon said Monday, announcing two new contracts that will put the detection and tracking systems in orbit by…

General Dynamics Mission Systems (CAGE 1VPW8) of Fairfax, Virginia is awarded a contract in the amount of $324,516,613 ($162,954,122 Base + $161,562,491 Options) to establish the ground Operations and Integration (O&I) segment for Tranche 1 of the National Defense Space Architecture.  This effort designs, develops, integrates, verifies and delivers integrated mission operations and support activities,…

Date: May 19, 2022 | Outlet: Gizmodo | By: Passant Rabie Two satellites recently exchanged more than 200 gigabits of data over a distance of about 60 miles (100 kilometers) using laser communication in space. The achievement sets the stage for yet another satellite constellation. Satellites generally don’t communicate directly with each other. Instead, they…

Date: May 19, 2022 | Outlet: GovConWire | By: Summer Myatt U.S. space agencies are prioritizing “integration by design” with mission partners, industry, academia and allied forces to tackle threats and deter adversaries in the largest and most highly contested domain today. Gen. James Dickinson, commander of the U.S. Space Command said the “partnered element”…

Date: February 10, 2022 | Outlet: Breaking Defense | By: Theresa Hitchens WASHINGTON: A foundational effort to test software for the Space Development Agency’s planned National Defense Space Architecture satellites successfully has wrapped up an initial demonstration of an on-board, automated data fusion capability, agency and industry sources said. On-board, or “edge,” processing — rather than being done at…

Date: January 12, 2022 | Outlet: Air Force Magazine | By: Amanda Miller A satellite constellation specially suited to tracking hypersonic missiles could be up and running by 2025. Director of the Space Development Agency Derek M. Tournear laid out the advantages of the Tracking Layer of SDA’s still-envisioned National Security Space Architecture in a…

Date: January 2, 2022 | Outlet: Government Matters The Space Development Agency (SDA) is called the Defense Department’s constructive disruptor for space acquisition, delivering space-based capabilities to the warfighter quickly. Derek Tournear, director of the Space Development Agency at the Defense Department, said his organization uses the spiral development model, delivering “good enough” capabilities every…

Date: December 6, 2021 | Outlet: SpaceNews | By: SpaceNews Staff SPACE DEVELOPMENT AGENCY When the Pentagon created the Space Development Agency in 2019 to stake out a new satellite architecture for the military, SDA chose as its motto Semper Citius, Latin for “always faster.” In less than three years since its inception, the SDA has launched…

Date: August 11, 2021 | Outlet: Defense News | By: Nathan Strout WASHINGTON — The Space Development Agency launched another experimental satellite Aug. 10 as it tries to reduce risk for its first satellites on orbit, set to begin launch in fall 2022. Carried into orbit aboard the Cygnus NG-16 spacecraft during its Commercial Resupply…