There were 7 bidders, so they may just have lost. The satellite bus might not be as expensive as the payload on these sats, and it was commented that the SpaceX bus in Tranche 0 was larger than really necessary for the mission because of their commoditized bus design (everything else in Tranche 0 and probably Tranche 1 can launch from ESPA rings). It's the whole bus/payload/integration package that matters.
I could see a repeat of NSSL Phase 1, with SpaceX bidding a Starship-based option that is not selected due to risk. Or was Tranche 1 structured like Tranche 0 with launch being a separate bid?
the Company reiterates its expectation to deliver all ten buses in 2022 to Lockheed Martin in support of the SDA Transport Layer Tranche 0 and has commenced work on the next forty-two satellites for Tranche 1, which we expect to begin delivering in 2023.
There is a thread to discuss the SDA LEO Constellations, linked in the top post. This isn't it. This thread is to cover the first launch campaign. If you want to start a discussion in the other thread, please put something more useful than "SpaceX is awesome and everyone else sucks."
The agency’s strategy to deploy a large constellation of small satellites for communications and missile-tracking is widely supported on Capitol Hill but lawmakers in the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act draft bill raised concerns about the ability of the NSSL program to perform SDA’s rideshare launches on budget and on schedule. Specifically, the House Armed Services Committee suggested that DoD should hire a “common launch integrator” to help manage the integration of SDA’s satellites on NSSL rockets. With a growing number of launches and a demanding schedule set by SDA, the HASC said it’s unclear how the Space Force intends to “drive down cost, reduce risk, and ensure launch reliability and performance.”<snip>The HASC suggested DoD could use the existing U.S. Space Force Launch Manifest Systems Integrator (LMSI) contract to handle the SDA payload integration workload.The current LMSI contractor, Parsons Corp., advocated for the HASC language.
Russian officials have made veiled threats to obliterate SpaceX’s internet satellite network which has served as a communications lifeline for the Ukrainian military.To date, however, “how many Starlink satellites have the Russians shot down? … zero,” noted Derek Tournear, director of the U.S. Space Force’s Space Development Agency. Although Russia in November demonstrated it can strike a satellite in low Earth orbit with a ballistic missile, the fact that it hasn’t taken down any Starlink satellites speaks to the power of a proliferated constellation to deter attacks and provide resilience, Tournear said Oct. 25 at a Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies event in Arlington, Virginia.
Starlink’s survivability in war a good sign for DoD’s future constellationQuote from: SpaceNewsRussian officials have made veiled threats to obliterate SpaceX’s internet satellite network which has served as a communications lifeline for the Ukrainian military.To date, however, “how many Starlink satellites have the Russians shot down? … zero,” noted Derek Tournear, director of the U.S. Space Force’s Space Development Agency. Although Russia in November demonstrated it can strike a satellite in low Earth orbit with a ballistic missile, the fact that it hasn’t taken down any Starlink satellites speaks to the power of a proliferated constellation to deter attacks and provide resilience, Tournear said Oct. 25 at a Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies event in Arlington, Virginia.
Quote from: su27k on 10/27/2022 06:57 amStarlink’s survivability in war a good sign for DoD’s future constellationQuote from: SpaceNewsRussian officials have made veiled threats to obliterate SpaceX’s internet satellite network which has served as a communications lifeline for the Ukrainian military.To date, however, “how many Starlink satellites have the Russians shot down? … zero,” noted Derek Tournear, director of the U.S. Space Force’s Space Development Agency. Although Russia in November demonstrated it can strike a satellite in low Earth orbit with a ballistic missile, the fact that it hasn’t taken down any Starlink satellites speaks to the power of a proliferated constellation to deter attacks and provide resilience, Tournear said Oct. 25 at a Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies event in Arlington, Virginia.SpaceX can replace them quicker than Russia could destroy them with ballistic missiles. The resulting debris would damage everybody's satellites.
Quote from: TrevorMonty on 10/27/2022 09:53 amQuote from: su27k on 10/27/2022 06:57 amStarlink’s survivability in war a good sign for DoD’s future constellationQuote from: SpaceNewsRussian officials have made veiled threats to obliterate SpaceX’s internet satellite network which has served as a communications lifeline for the Ukrainian military.To date, however, “how many Starlink satellites have the Russians shot down? … zero,” noted Derek Tournear, director of the U.S. Space Force’s Space Development Agency. Although Russia in November demonstrated it can strike a satellite in low Earth orbit with a ballistic missile, the fact that it hasn’t taken down any Starlink satellites speaks to the power of a proliferated constellation to deter attacks and provide resilience, Tournear said Oct. 25 at a Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies event in Arlington, Virginia.SpaceX can replace them quicker than Russia could destroy them with ballistic missiles. The resulting debris would damage everybody's satellites.This is silly talk.The only effective way to shut down Starlink - or any other similar constellation - is to attack the gateway ground stations: there is only about 120 of them and a small Hellfire-class missile would probably disable the whole nine-mushroom Gateway.Fortunately for Ukraine - and I guess unfortunately for Russia - all the Starlink Gateway locations used by Ukraine Starlink users are outside Ukraine and in the territory of NATO countries. A strike on any of them is a direct attack on a NATO country and would provoke an Article 5 response by all NATO countries on Russia. That makes the Starlink Gateways 'off limits' for Russia Edit: spelling
The Space Development Agency wants to include hosted payloads on its future data relay satellites that can provide an alternate to GPS positioning, navigation and timing services, but has yet to determine exactly how — something that officials are hoping industry responses to the agency’s recent request for information, due today, will help clarify.“The goal is to proliferate a complementary PNT service that can augment DOD PNT users, providing enhancements to military GPS users,” Jennifer Elzea, SDA spokesperson, told Breaking Defense, meaning that users “could use both GPS and the SDA signal.”
The Space Development Agency is renaming its planned network of military satellites “Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture,” the agency announced Jan. 23.SDA, a former Defense Department agency that is now part of the U.S. Space Force, previously used the name “National Defense Space Architecture” to describe a low Earth orbit constellation of small satellites scheduled to start launching in March.
The Space Development Agency is planning a new procurement of 72 satellites to continue to build out a military constellation in low Earth orbit.In a Jan. 31 draft solicitation, the agency seeks input from vendors interested in bidding for 72 satellites and supporting ground systems that will make up a portion of a planned 216-satellite Tranche 2 Transport Layer. Responses are due March 1.
The U.S. Department of Defense, whose Space Development Agency has already forced a de facto common technical standard on optical satellite transmissions, may be able to accomplish the same feat with interoperability among satellite broadband systems in geostationary and non-geostioantary orbit, the head of Amazon Web Services’s global satcom division said.Paul Mattear also said the DoD’s recent solicitations will also assure that geostationary-orbit satellites, whose relevance is under question in some markets, will remain viable to offer network resilience.
By requiring suppliers of laser terminals to comply with a common set of standards, the U.S. Space Development Agency has helped propel the industry forward, executives said Feb. 8 at the SmallSat Symposium in Mountain View, California. <snip>The agency in 2021 issued a set of technical specifications that optical terminal manufacturers have to comply with in order to compete for SDA contracts. SDA is buying satellites from multiple manufacturers and all their satellites have to be interoperable. SDA’s move to set standards and force suppliers to coalesce around them has been game changing for the industry, said Sven Rettig, chief commercial officer of Tesat Spacecom, a Germany-based manufacturer of optical terminals that is expanding its U.S. operations to support SDA satellite suppliers.
