Space Times

Main Topics Lunar * NASA awarded $590M in CLPS contracts for 2028 Artemis Missions: two contracts to Astrobotic , one to Firefly , and one to Intuitive Machines . [ source ] * NASA announced they will repurpose their spare PROMISE nuclear Mars rover to send to the Moon. [ source ] * Lunar Forge came out of stealth targeting a 2027 demonstration of their laser sintering device capable of building s...

Launch * Rocket Lab executed a successful mission for the USSF titled Victus Haze in which they went from ‘Notice To Launch’ in 16 hours and 42 minutes, after which they activated and readied their Pioneer spacecraft on orbit in the 38th hour of their 72 hour deadline window. [ source ] * Rocket Lab was awarded 3 electron launches for NASA’s PolSIR and TSIS-2 Sun-Earth science missions. [ source ]...

This week includes a special interview with Sumant Sharma, CEO of Eradrive ! Launch * ISAR scrubbed the most recent scheduled launch of their Spectrum vehicle, marking the fourth such scrubbing this year. [ source ] * Chinese startup Landspace’s Zhuque-2E rocket, launched on June 9th, experienced an upper stage failure during parts of its disposal burn. [ source ] * China continued its accelerated...

Main Topics ODC * Google announced a multi-year contract worth $920M/mo to use 110,000 NVIDIA GPUs in SpaceX’s Colossus supercomputer. [ source ] * SpaceX announced the AI1 sat - a 150 kW bus with a 70 meter wide footprint for use in orbital data center infrastructure. [ source ] * Orbital raised $5M pre-seed for orbital data centers led by Andreessen Horowitz Speedrun targeting a 100kW compute pa...

Main Topics This week includes an excerpt of our interview with Johannes Galatsanos, CEO of Diffraqtion , to learn about the quantum camera for space domain awareness! Subscribe to be notified when the full interview drops later this week. Defense * Odysseus Space won €5.2M in contracts under EOBLINDING to blind enemy sats using their optical communications technology and RESIST to use AI for EU s...

Main Topics Rockets * Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket exploded in historic fashion during a static fire test at Launchpad 36 in Cape Canaveral on Thursday, May 27th. [ source ] * Gilmour Space announced an additional $14.2M in further capital investment, debating the pros and cons of breaking that and other investment out from their current oversubscribed Series E round into a separate Series F rou...

Main Topics Dr. Alexis Harroun, CEO of Juno Propulsion , joins Space Times this week to explain how their Rotating Detonation Combustion thruster will change the game for in-space mobility! Headliners * Starship v3 launched on May 22nd with mixed success, the booster lost 3 engines and landed but not as expected, while Starship lost an RVAC engine but still accomplished its landing in the Indian O...

Main Topics Launch * Aetherflux rebranded to Cowboy Space and raised a $275M series B while announcing their pivot into both Rocketry and the Orbital Data Center markets. [ source ] * SpaceX removed Transporter mission options past 2029, indicating a clear timeline and focus on the launch and success of Starship in that same timeframe. [ source ] * Google rumored to be in talks with SpaceX to laun...

Main Topics Rockets * Rocket Lab announced a partnership with Raytheon and Anduril to execute on Space Based Interceptor contracts issued through Golden Dome. [ source ] * K2 Space was selected by Anduril to host SBI payloads via their high-powered satellite platforms to fulfill golden dome contracts. [ source ] * Seagate announced a partnership with Firefly Aerospace and Lockheed Martin to develo...

Main Topics Comms * York Space announced the purchase of ALL.SPACE for ~$355M in a scope style acquisition to expand York Space’s ground and mobile terminal technology capabilities while making ALL.SPACE a subsidiary that will continue operations. [ source ] * Celestial Acquisition Co acquired Nokia’s Modul8 space cellular division after Nokia broke the Modul8 team out to a separate business entit...

Main Topics Defense * USSF selected Anduril, Booz Allen Hamilton, General Dynamics, GITAI, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Quindar, Raytheon, Sci-Tec, SpaceX, True Anomaly, and Turion Space for over 20 golden dome Space Based Interceptor contracts totalling $3.2B. [ source ] * USSF awarded $1.4M and $500K to Leidos and Maplarge respectively for battle planning software through the Commercial So...

Main Topics Infrastructure * Orbit Fab announced their Raven and Nest fuel transportation and orbital fuel depot vehicles respectively, boasting a combined fueling capacity of roughly 200 kg. [ source ] * Dawn Aerospace announced their Loop Network consisting of a Space Utility Vehicle (SUV) and Orbital Propulsion Depot (OPD) offering to refuel satellites that have their 600 gram docking port inst...

Main Topics Human Spaceflight * NASA’s Artemis II returned home! After a successful 10 day journey around the Moon, the Integrity capsule carrying four astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen safely splashed down in the pacific. [ source ] * Azora Space used their 7cm aperture mobile optical communications terminal to receive a signal from Orion’s laser communicat...

Main Topics On-Orbit * LeoLabs detected a Starlink destructive anomaly creating tens of debris at 560km altitude. [ source ] * Amazon is in discussions to buy Globalstar for $9B to acquire their 48 satellites, 24 ground stations, L & S band spectrum rights, and partnership with Apple. [ source ] * Delta Airlines selected Amazon LEO to provide in-flight connectivity for 500 planes in 2028. [ source...

Main Topics Spacecraft * Katalyst selected Arianespace to fly its RPO GEO spacecraft NEXUS-1 in 2027 to service a defense satellite and potentially commercial customers. [ source ] * Symphony Space debuted their Adagio platform, a persistent on-orbit modular multi-mission payload platform. [ source ] * Starfish Space announced a new partner for their Otter Pup 2 RPO target after the original RPO t...

Main Topics Orbital Data Centers * Nvidia announced their new Vera Rubin chipset, upgrades to Thor and Orin chips to optimize inference per watt, and partnerships with Aetherflux , Axiom Space , Kepler Communications , Planet Labs , Sophia Space and Starcloud . [ source ] * Starcloud filed to launch 88,000 satellites for their orbital data centers. [ source ] * Blue Origin filed Project Sunrise to...

Main Topics Optical Comms * Rheinmetall withdrew from the acquisition bidding for Mynaric . [ source ] * ESA has awarded Mynaric with a contract to build a laser communications demonstration system for its High Throughput Optical Network (HydRON) project. [ source ] * Shanghai-based laser communications startup BlueStar Optical Domain has raised a $72M Series C to localize production and scale to...

Main Topics Loft Orbital * Loft Orbital Co-Founder and COO, Alex Greenberg, joins us this week to discuss how they’re executing on AI in space, delivering space sovereignty, and more! [ source ] Imagery * Little Place Labs announces a new partnership with TakeMe2Space to integrate their Edge AI software suite (ORBITFY) into TakeMe2Space’s in-space inference platform (OrbitLab). [ source ] * Telesp...

Main Topics Space Times will be at Satshow 2026! * Listen to this week’s podcast to get a discount code for the conference * Hear part of our interview with conference Chairman Jeffrey Hill * Reach out to us if you’re interested in meeting and/or receiving media coverage Comms * Aalyria raised a $100M Series B, led by Battery Ventures and J2 Ventures, valuing Aalyria at $1.3 billion to fund the de...

Main Topics Earth Observation * BlackSky secured a new eight-figure international contract to deliver a Gen-3 sovereign space-based intelligence solution. [ source ] * Vantor is bringing Google’s Earth AI imagery models into Tensorglobe, making Vantor the industry’s first to deploy these advanced foundation models inside sovereign classified and air-gapped environments. [ source ] * Aspia Space ha...

Main Topics Launch * Stoke Space announced an extension of their Series D financing round to $860M, adding $350M to the initial $510M raised in October 2025 bringing their total funds raised to $1.34B. This money is intended to accelerate the deployment of their Nova launch vehicle, and operationalization of the Cape Canaveral Launch Pad 14. [ source ] * ULA’s Vulcan rocket successfully launched 3...

Main Topics Communications * SpaceX is rumored to be developing its own Starlink-branded smartphone to connect with the company’s satellite services. The device is intended to help boost revenue as SpaceX prepares for an IPO. [ source ] * Spanish telco MasOrange will trial Starlink’s Direct-to-Cell service under a new agreement with SpaceX . MasOrange plans to carry out a technical pilot in the Sp...

Main Topics Communications * Northwood , a next-generation phased array ground station provider, has raised $100M in Series B funding led by Washington Harbour Partners LP and co-led by Andreessen Horowitz, this was announced alongside the closing of a $49 million Space Force deal. [ source ] * Eutelsat said a planned sale of its passive ground infrastructure to a private equity firm announced in...

Major News Space Sovereignty * Loft Orbital wins €50M SAR contract from French space agency CNES to be prime contractor for DESIR SAR satellite with Thales and Tekever to deploy in early 2029. This project is part of France’s Defense Procurement Agency’s efforts to secure sovereign national radar imaging. [ source ] * Marble Imaging entered a strategic partnership with French aerospace and technol...

Main Topics Space Dominance * China files for ~200,000 satellites in GEO with ITU, split between two constellations, CTC-1 and CTC-2 , each for 96,714. Regardless of how many actually launch, this is illustrative of China’s priority to reserve slots in the less contested GEO orbits [ source ] * Vyoma has successfully launched Flamingo-1, its first space domain awareness satellite, to a 500 km sun-...