SpaceX wins contract for missile-warning satellites

[FutureSpaceTourist]

SpaceX, L3Harris win Space Development Agency contracts to build missile-warning satellites
by Sandra Erwin — October 5, 2020

SDA Director Derek Tournear said SpaceX “came in with an extremely credible proposal” that leverages the Starlink assembly line
WASHINGTON — The Space Development Agency awarded SpaceX a $149 million contract and L3Harris a $193.5 million contract to each build four satellites to detect and track ballistic and hypersonic missiles.

https://spacenews.com/spacex-l3harris-win-space-development-agency-contracts-to-build-missile-warning-satellites/

Edit to add: due to launch in 2022

[intelati]

each build four satellites to detect and track ballistic and hypersonic missiles.

Hmm... Are these planned to be at a higher altitude (Like MEO for GPS?)?

[ioncloud9]

This is fantastic news. They are able to leverage their satellite business into additional business and more launches. I have high expectations that they will win the remaining part of the contract.

[gongora]

 Thread for this program is: SDA LEO Constellations

[Suicidhez]

This was a surprising award. I always thought SpaceX' strategy would be to tap markets with some commercial customers: launch services for commercial satellites, Dragon for commercial human space flight missions and tourism and Starlink, whose main revenue stream in the long run should come from consumer broadband.

This award has no civil or commercial use, but just defence purpose. For me that's a big shift and I must say I'm a bit disappointed. But well, very hard not to grab some juicy business from the best customer in the world..

[AbuSimbel]

This was a surprising award. I always thought SpaceX' strategy would be to tap markets with some commercial customers: launch services for commercial satellites, Dragon for commercial human space flight missions and tourism and Starlink, whose main revenue stream in the long run should come from consumer broadband.

This award has no civil or commercial use, but just defence purpose. For me that's a big shift and I must say I'm a bit disappointed. But well, very hard not to grab some juicy business from the best customer in the world..

With Starlink they are the commercial costumers of their own architecture, now they’re leveraging it to also gain govt contracts as they do with F9 and Dragon.

Seems (smart) business as usual to me.

[su27k]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

I wonder too if this signals an expansion of its business, that SpaceX is now aiming to become a generic satellite manufacturer and operator, something like LM's space division. LM gets $10B per year from its space division, so there's certainly money in this business.

Another consideration was mentioned in the other thread, that so far the satellite industry has been slow to take advantages offered by reusability, maybe SpaceX just gets tired of waiting, so why not just DIY? After all F9 is just a start, Starship will offer orders of magnitude improvement over F9, if satellite industry is so slow to adapt to F9, how much longer will SpaceX have to wait for them to take advantage of Starship? I think the conclusion is that they might as well just do the satellite part too, it's where the money is anyway.

If this conclusion is correct, I expect we'll see more satellite offerings from SpaceX that will take full advantage of their own LVs, not just in defense, but also in NASA unmanned exploration/science missions. LM built a lot of NASA probes and landers, plus KH-11, NG is building JWST, will SpaceX propose successor to KH-11 and JWST that can be launched and maintained via Starship? Will they propose outer solar system probes launched on expendable Starship? I think the potential is there.

[wannamoonbase]

This was a surprising award. I always thought SpaceX' strategy would be to tap markets with some commercial customers: launch services for commercial satellites, Dragon for commercial human space flight missions and tourism and Starlink, whose main revenue stream in the long run should come from consumer broadband.

This award has no civil or commercial use, but just defence purpose. For me that's a big shift and I must say I'm a bit disappointed. But well, very hard not to grab some juicy business from the best customer in the world..

With Starlink they are the commercial costumers of their own architecture, now they’re leveraging it to also gain govt contracts as they do with F9 and Dragon.

Seems (smart) business as usual to me.

Pretty cool sell for SpaceX.

Getting everything into orbit is going to require Starship or a few more F9 pads.

[whitelancer64]

This was a surprising award. I always thought SpaceX' strategy would be to tap markets with some commercial customers: launch services for commercial satellites, Dragon for commercial human space flight missions and tourism and Starlink, whose main revenue stream in the long run should come from consumer broadband.

This award has no civil or commercial use, but just defence purpose. For me that's a big shift and I must say I'm a bit disappointed. But well, very hard not to grab some juicy business from the best customer in the world..

I don't think it's a big shift, or perhaps even any kind of shift at all. SpaceX has had a very long history with DARPA and the USAF being among its first funders / customers. NROL-76 (2017) was also a pure DOD payload. They've also launched military satellites for other countries.

[RonM]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

SpaceX launches Air Force and Space Force payloads. The military is looking at additional SpaceX services such as Starlink and Starship. SpaceX is a defense contractor.

[Zed_Noir]

<snip>
This award has no civil or commercial use, but just defence purpose.
<snip>

Think that is not correct. The DoD have just pay for the development of a LEO optical observation platform with high data transfer rate. The current optical imaging providers should be worry.

[woods170]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

SpaceX launches Air Force and Space Force payloads. The military is looking at additional SpaceX services such as Starlink and Starship. SpaceX is a defense contractor.

Correct. And SpaceX has been a defense contractor ever since Falcon 1.

[TRS717]

each build four satellites to detect and track ballistic and hypersonic missiles.

Hmm... Are these planned to be at a higher altitude (Like MEO for GPS?)?

Given that these are based on the Starlink, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see them launched as part of a regular Starlink package. With a constellation of up to 42,000 Starlinks planned (per Wikipedia) this would enormously complicate their targeting by an opponent in the event of, God forbid, space-based hostilities. 

[freddo411]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

I wonder too if this signals an expansion of its business, that SpaceX is now aiming to become a generic satellite manufacturer and operator, something like LM's space division. LM gets $10B per year from its space division, so there's certainly money in this business.

Another consideration was mentioned in the other thread, that so far the satellite industry has been slow to take advantages offered by reusability, maybe SpaceX just gets tired of waiting, so why not just DIY? After all F9 is just a start, Starship will offer orders of magnitude improvement over F9, if satellite industry is so slow to adapt to F9, how much longer will SpaceX have to wait for them to take advantage of Starship? I think the conclusion is that they might as well just do the satellite part too, it's where the money is anyway.

If this conclusion is correct, I expect we'll see more satellite offerings from SpaceX that will take full advantage of their own LVs, not just in defense, but also in NASA unmanned exploration/science missions. LM built a lot of NASA probes and landers, plus KH-11, NG is building JWST, will SpaceX propose successor to KH-11 and JWST that can be launched and maintained via Starship? Will they propose outer solar system probes launched on expendable Starship? I think the potential is there.

I strongly agree with this.

I think that moving from expendable (say Atlas V)  to reusable system (say Falcon 9) was only a roughly 2x price improvement factor.     

On the other hand, moving from bespoke satellite construction (say GOES 16 at roughly 500 million) to a sat similar to a starlink bird ( roughly 1 million ) represents roughly a 100X price improvement.   This does not take into account the huge benefits that can be obtained operating a constellation architecture instead of a one-off design.    There's a lot of potential profit there.   There's also a huge price improvement opportunity for the customer as well.

Of course there's an important synergy between having lots of customer satellites and having a (potentially) inexpensive launcher.   The launcher can only be cheap if it flies often.   So making inexpensive sats helps the launch biz, and vice versa.

Ironically, NASA will move very slowly away from their old ten-year build cycle, +billion dollar, battlestar galatica missions paradigm.    I predict there may be 100s of craft on or around Mars before NASA's +billion dollar sample return mission launches, for example.

[baldusi]

At first glance, I would assume that this is also the result of DoD's shift in policy from big sats to smaller but more numerous fleets to increase resilience. Since China demonstrated GEO direct kill capability (ok, they just demonstrated a 100,000km "sounding rocket"), and practically everybody demonstrated LEO ASAT capabilities, the US has been thinking of a strategy shift to hundreds or thousands of s/c to make the fleets "resilient".
I don't think any US contractor has much experience in the hundreds/thousands fleets like SpaceX. If I'm not mistaken Airbus (through a US subsidiary) is the OneWeb contractor, and Thales is the Iridium-NEXT prime. SNC did the Orbcomm-G2, though. But if I wanted a purely US contractor with demonstrated capability to build, integrate, launch and operate thousands of serially produced satellites, I can think of no other than SpaceX.
I wonder if Elon didn't thought of this in advanced and included it in its satellite division business plan.

[docmordrid]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

I wonder too if this signals an expansion of its business, that SpaceX is now aiming to become a generic satellite manufacturer and operator, something like LM's space division. LM gets $10B per year from its space division, so there's certainly money in this business.
>

At the risk of going slightly OT, but related to your business expansion point, ISTM the USAF may well be prompting SpaceX to take on a greatly expanded defense role.

The notion hit me on reading this article about the USAF's Next Generation Air Defense (NGAD) fighter.

Dr. Will Roper is the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics.

Defense News...

The US Air Force has built and flown a mysterious full-scale prototype of its future fighter jet

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force has secretly designed, built and flown at least one prototype of its enigmatic next-generation fighter jet, the service’s top acquisition official confirmed to Defense News on Sept. 14.
>
And because the advanced manufacturing techniques that are critical for building NGAD were pioneered by the commercial sector, the program could open the door for new prime contractors for the aircraft to emerge — and perhaps give SpaceX founder Elon Musk a shot at designing an F-35 competitor.

“I have to imagine there will be a lot of engineers — maybe famous ones with well-known household names with billions of dollars to invest — that will decide starting the world’s greatest aircraft company to build the world’s greatest aircraft with the Air Force is exactly the kind of inspiring thing they want to do as a hobby or even a main gig,” Roper said.
>

[DistantTemple]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

I wonder too if this signals an expansion of its business, that SpaceX is now aiming to become a generic satellite manufacturer and operator, something like LM's space division. LM gets $10B per year from its space division, so there's certainly money in this business.
>

At the risk of going slightly OT, but related to your business expansion point, ISTM the USAF may well be prompting SpaceX to take on a greatly expanded defense role.

The notion hit me on reading this article about the USAF's Next Generation Air Defense (NGAD) fighter.

Dr. Will Roper is the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics.

Defense News...

The US Air Force has built and flown a mysterious full-scale prototype of its future fighter jet

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force has secretly designed, built and flown at least one prototype of its enigmatic next-generation fighter jet, the service’s top acquisition official confirmed to Defense News on Sept. 14.
>
And because the advanced manufacturing techniques that are critical for building NGAD were pioneered by the commercial sector, the program could open the door for new prime contractors for the aircraft to emerge — and perhaps give SpaceX founder Elon Musk a shot at designing an F-35 competitor.

“I have to imagine there will be a lot of engineers — maybe famous ones with well-known household names with billions of dollars to invest — that will decide starting the world’s greatest aircraft company to build the world’s greatest aircraft with the Air Force is exactly the kind of inspiring thing they want to do as a hobby or even a main gig,” Roper said.
>

None of that IMO is "right up Elon's street"
He loves the technology, but he is not doing it for the thrills, or the reputation, or for the future history books, but to make a positive contribution to mankind. I doubt he sees the USA as being immune to becoming a war-monger.
He has an overflowing bucket list of gigantic projects, and developing a war-fighter.... will be both far from the top of that list... and possibly considered a risk!
IMO its almost an insult, the way it is worded. If he does it, it will be to make money for his "real" projects, and to undermine the "old" expensive contractors, save the taxpayer money, and re-boot the aeroplane industry.

I do think he wants to make engineering generally a "skunk works", exciting hands-on discipline, where stuff actually gets built! I would think he believes this is needed across all engineering and technology, and is a key part of "saving humanity" -  in this case from a stifling of the inventive spirit, and thus of progress.

[docmordrid]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

I wonder too if this signals an expansion of its business, that SpaceX is now aiming to become a generic satellite manufacturer and operator, something like LM's space division. LM gets $10B per year from its space division, so there's certainly money in this business.
>

At the risk of going slightly OT, but related to your business expansion point, ISTM the USAF may well be prompting SpaceX to take on a greatly expanded defense role.

>
>
And because the advanced manufacturing techniques that are critical for building NGAD were pioneered by the commercial sector, the program could open the door for new prime contractors for the aircraft to emerge — and perhaps give SpaceX founder Elon Musk a shot at designing an F-35 competitor.

“I have to imagine there will be a lot of engineers — maybe famous ones with well-known household names with billions of dollars to invest — that will decide starting the world’s greatest aircraft company to build the world’s greatest aircraft with the Air Force is exactly the kind of inspiring thing they want to do as a hobby or even a main gig,” Roper said.
>

None of that IMO is "right up Elon's street"
He loves the technology, but he is not doing it for the thrills, or the reputation, or for the future history books, but to make a positive contribution to mankind. I doubt he sees the USA as being immune to becoming a war-monger.
He has an overflowing bucket list of gigantic projects, and developing a war-fighter.... will be both far from the top of that list...
>

Musk is doing big projects to make money for Mars; StarLink, DoD launches. and pitching Starship to USSF and USAF. Is there a  higher paying DoD aerospace program than producing attack aircraft?

[MySDCUserID]

I wouldn’t call it a “shift” in their business until they start developing lethal systems, if ever.

[toren]

Starlink has always struck me as a 'platform' play in the Silicon Valley / hitech sense.  It's an orbital data transport layer that can make plenty of money on its own, but it's also a potential hardware/software architecture on which other payloads/apps can be hosted. 

I'm only a bit surprised that DOD is the first to step up on this possibility, though as already noted it's right in line with their stated strategic direction.  I'd figured to see a current or potential remote sensing startup realize that just like they don't need to build the rocket, they don't need to build the satellite either.

[su27k]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

SpaceX launches Air Force and Space Force payloads. The military is looking at additional SpaceX services such as Starlink and Starship. SpaceX is a defense contractor.

Only if you use the broadest definition of the term, which is anybody who does business with DoD is a defense contractor. By this definition Office Depot is also a defense contractor since they sell paperclips to the Pentagon.

I'm thinking of a more narrow definition: Anybody who builds products that only military would use is a defense contractor. So far everything SpaceX built has been dual-use, none of its hardware is exclusively aimed at the military. Yes Falcon launched some military satellites, but it also launched commercial and civil payloads, the rocket doesn't care about what's on top of it. Same thing with Starlink, the constellation doesn't care whether it's relaying cat video or DoD transmissions, it's all bits to it. Even the EELV2 infrastructure and hardware SpaceX is about to built has potential civil use cases for NASA. But a missile warning satellite? There's no possible way to use it for commercial or civil services, only the military would want something like this.

And this reminds me: Isn't this also the first time SpaceX building space hardware for someone else? So far all the hardware they built, they retain ownership, as Gwynne Shotwell puts it, they don't sell rockets, they sell launch services. This particular contract may be the first time SpaceX builds hardware whose ownership will be transferred to a customer (and the customer being DoD no less).

[M.E.T.]

This is not a surprising development. SpaceX will spread into every niche of the Space industry where their innovative technology provides them with a competitive advantage.

They started launching large payloads to orbit. Added manned flight. Then pushed into  Rocketlab’s smallsat niche. Then expanded into satellite manufacturing for mega constellations. This led to economies of scale and innovation in that field, leading to this new award.

The same will eventually apply to deep space exploration and asteroid mining. If the market is there, they will move into it. I expect they will dominate space in this century and perhaps beyond.

Weyland corporation comes to mind.

[watermod]

Glad to see a shell game I talked about in the forums long ago start coming to life.

[Asteroza]

Weyland corporation comes to mind.

That didn't end well for the company founder. You know how Engineers are...

[RotoSequence]

Weyland corporation comes to mind.

That didn't end well for the company founder. You know how Engineers are...

I think that's an aspiration of business model ("building better worlds"), not amoral profit seeking opportunities with high body counts. 

[M.E.T.]

Weyland corporation comes to mind.

That didn't end well for the company founder. You know how Engineers are...

I think that's an aspiration of business model ("building better worlds"), not amoral profit seeking opportunities with high body counts. 

Haha. Yeah, my point is that SpaceX has a platform to access space more cheaply than anyone else and has started leveraging that into associated technologies - like satellite manufacturing and operations, telecoms and military contracting, etc. These niches are mutually reinforcing and they will continue to evolve their service offerings to meet every available opportunity in the space economy.

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

An item of speculation about what features the Tracking sat version of Starlink would use based on the existing and future Starlink capabilities:

ISL - Using the protocols of the SDA communication layer ISL.

Ka band phased array - A high bandwidth data capability is still needed. But Ku band is likely not going to be used.

The internal data processing set (last I heard there was 120+ CPU cores) - There is some need for this just for data handling plus having redundancy is a plus. Eventually the massive computational capabilities can be used to perform significant image processing so remote users of the data can get high usage from the data without having a massive computer center just a comm link and console. Total computational capability is an estimated 120 GFLOPS or greater. Future capability could be the detection, tracking and then warning of theater commanders of an incoming long range missile attack (anything that is very high or exoatmospheric trajectory) by the sat itself.

Possible retention of the solar shades - It may be useful to retain the shades both for reflection reduction and for shading the IR optics from solar impingement affecting usability.

All of the CC (upgraded security provisions) and propulsion, power, IMU, Navigation capabilities.

[Star One]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

I wonder too if this signals an expansion of its business, that SpaceX is now aiming to become a generic satellite manufacturer and operator, something like LM's space division. LM gets $10B per year from its space division, so there's certainly money in this business.
&gt;

At the risk of going slightly OT, but related to your business expansion point, ISTM the USAF may well be prompting SpaceX to take on a greatly expanded defense role.

The notion hit me on reading this article about the USAF's Next Generation Air Defense (NGAD) fighter.

Dr. Will Roper is the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics.

Defense News...

The US Air Force has built and flown a mysterious full-scale prototype of its future fighter jet

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force has secretly designed, built and flown at least one prototype of its enigmatic next-generation fighter jet, the service’s top acquisition official confirmed to Defense News on Sept. 14.
&gt;
And because the advanced manufacturing techniques that are critical for building NGAD were pioneered by the commercial sector, the program could open the door for new prime contractors for the aircraft to emerge — and perhaps give SpaceX founder Elon Musk a shot at designing an F-35 competitor.

“I have to imagine there will be a lot of engineers — maybe famous ones with well-known household names with billions of dollars to invest — that will decide starting the world’s greatest aircraft company to build the world’s greatest aircraft with the Air Force is exactly the kind of inspiring thing they want to do as a hobby or even a main gig,” Roper said.
&gt;

None of that IMO is "right up Elon's street"
He loves the technology, but he is not doing it for the thrills, or the reputation, or for the future history books, but to make a positive contribution to mankind. I doubt he sees the USA as being immune to becoming a war-monger.
He has an overflowing bucket list of gigantic projects, and developing a war-fighter.... will be both far from the top of that list... and possibly considered a risk!
IMO its almost an insult, the way it is worded. If he does it, it will be to make money for his "real" projects, and to undermine the "old" expensive contractors, save the taxpayer money, and re-boot the aeroplane industry.

I do think he wants to make engineering generally a "skunk works", exciting hands-on discipline, where stuff actually gets built! I would think he believes this is needed across all engineering and technology, and is a key part of "saving humanity" -  in this case from a stifling of the inventive spirit, and thus of progress.

I very much doubt that Space X would turn down launching a DOD payload even if it was a space weapons platform. He’s a businessman first &amp; foremost not some kind of moral arbiter.

[Nomadd]

An item of speculation about what features the Tracking sat version of Starlink would use based on the existing and future Starlink capabilities:

ISL - Using the protocols of the SDA communication layer ISL.

Ka band phased array - A high bandwidth data capability is still needed. But Ku band is likely not going to be used.

The internal data processing set (last I heard there was 120+ CPU cores) - There is some need for this just for data handling plus having redundancy is a plus. Eventually the massive computational capabilities can be used to perform significant image processing so remote users of the data can get high usage from the data without having a massive computer center just a comm link and console. Total computational capability is an estimated 120 GFLOPS or greater. Future capability could be the detection, tracking and then warning of theater commanders of an incoming long range missile attack (anything that is very high or exoatmospheric trajectory) by the sat itself.

Possible retention of the solar shades - It may be useful to retain the shades both for reflection reduction and for shading the IR optics from solar impingement affecting usability.

All of the CC (upgraded security provisions) and propulsion, power, IMU, Navigation capabilities.

Ku band will be used in the next phase, when they start rolling ground based systems into the network.

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

An item of speculation about what features the Tracking sat version of Starlink would use based on the existing and future Starlink capabilities:

ISL - Using the protocols of the SDA communication layer ISL.

Ka band phased array - A high bandwidth data capability is still needed. But Ku band is likely not going to be used.

The internal data processing set (last I heard there was 120+ CPU cores) - There is some need for this just for data handling plus having redundancy is a plus. Eventually the massive computational capabilities can be used to perform significant image processing so remote users of the data can get high usage from the data without having a massive computer center just a comm link and console. Total computational capability is an estimated 120 GFLOPS or greater. Future capability could be the detection, tracking and then warning of theater commanders of an incoming long range missile attack (anything that is very high or exoatmospheric trajectory) by the sat itself.

Possible retention of the solar shades - It may be useful to retain the shades both for reflection reduction and for shading the IR optics from solar impingement affecting usability.

All of the CC (upgraded security provisions) and propulsion, power, IMU, Navigation capabilities.

Ku band will be used in the next phase, when they start rolling ground based systems into the network.

This is about features that is needed for the DOD SDA systems. Are you saying that they are targeting Ku band vs using Ka uplink/downlink for the communication layer? The implementation would need to be compatible with the communication layer ground support systems.

[gongora]

The Tracking Layer sats are going to send their data through the Transport Layer sats.

[Nomadd]

An item of speculation about what features the Tracking sat version of Starlink would use based on the existing and future Starlink capabilities:

ISL - Using the protocols of the SDA communication layer ISL.

Ka band phased array - A high bandwidth data capability is still needed. But Ku band is likely not going to be used.

The internal data processing set (last I heard there was 120+ CPU cores) - There is some need for this just for data handling plus having redundancy is a plus. Eventually the massive computational capabilities can be used to perform significant image processing so remote users of the data can get high usage from the data without having a massive computer center just a comm link and console. Total computational capability is an estimated 120 GFLOPS or greater. Future capability could be the detection, tracking and then warning of theater commanders of an incoming long range missile attack (anything that is very high or exoatmospheric trajectory) by the sat itself.

Possible retention of the solar shades - It may be useful to retain the shades both for reflection reduction and for shading the IR optics from solar impingement affecting usability.

All of the CC (upgraded security provisions) and propulsion, power, IMU, Navigation capabilities.

Ku band will be used in the next phase, when they start rolling ground based systems into the network.

This is about features that is needed for the DOD SDA systems. Are you saying that they are targeting Ku band vs using Ka uplink/downlink for the communication layer? The implementation would need to be compatible with the communication layer ground support systems.

Every time I try to type what I was talking about, I don't like the results. Needs work. Mostly involving data back and forth to sites that isn't huge amounts of raw sensor data needing huge amounts of processing. I'm sort of picturing the network hooking in field sites across the globe. Giving battalion level support and other jobs that they'll eventually discover are more practical with these sats than with the multi billion dollar systems they've been launching. The idea of a grunt sticking a Starlink antenna up to tap into the system instead of the gear they have now is going to look pretty appealing.
 I still remember GIs buying Kmart handheld GPS receivers in the early days because the glacial military procurement system couldn't get anything done in less than geological time spans.

 *Disclaimer....My first network job was finding a wifi bridge/master that would handle Appletalk, and I can't really talk intelligently about modern protocols*

[butters]

SpaceX will undoubtedly utilize their multiple-fault-tolerant computing architecture for these satellites, because they don't have much if any experience with traditional rad-hardened flight computers. But it would be surprising if the tracking layer application requires a ton of on-orbit processing power, because L3-Harris is under contract to deliver comparable satellites, and I don't think they have much if any experience flying powerful computing platforms in space.

I'd further speculate, for the same reasons (but pertaining to York/Lockheed), that the transport layer satellites are bent-pipe analog repeaters more similar to OneWeb than Starlink.

[gongora]

I'd further speculate, for the same reasons (but pertaining to York/Lockheed), that the transport layer satellites are bent-pipe analog repeaters more similar to OneWeb than Starlink.

You might want to acquaint yourself with the requirement for the project before you go making statements like that.

[LouScheffer]

SpaceX launches Air Force and Space Force payloads. The military is looking at additional SpaceX services such as Starlink and Starship. SpaceX is a defense contractor.

Correct. And SpaceX has been a defense contractor ever since Falcon 1.

It will be interesting to see if this remains so.  Up until now, SpaceX has certainly made most of its money selling to the government.

But it's possible that Starlink might change this, making most of SpaceX's income commercial.  Then they would be like Verizon, which sells a similar amount to the government as SpaceX (see, for example,  Verizon lands massive $2.5 billion DoD service contract).  But Verizon is not generally considered a defense contractor since it makes most of its sales (about $30B/year) in the commercial market.

The same might well happen to SpaceX.  If Starlink succeeds strongly, they could become a vertically integrated internet provider, whose technology branch sells stuff and services to the government.

[Ludus]

<snip>
This award has no civil or commercial use, but just defence purpose.
<snip>

Think that is not correct. The DoD have just pay for the development of a LEO optical observation platform with high data transfer rate. The current optical imaging providers should be worry.

24/7 LEO observation of everywhere on the planet with the data flowing directly into Starlink and processed with image recognition AI seems like an obvious next step for SpaceX. Same satellite platform, shared components, same mass production, launch and deployment. Same laser links. It would be enormously valuable for many different applications.

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

<snip>
This award has no civil or commercial use, but just defence purpose.
<snip>

Think that is not correct. The DoD have just pay for the development of a LEO optical observation platform with high data transfer rate. The current optical imaging providers should be worry.

24/7 LEO observation of everywhere on the planet with the data flowing directly into Starlink and processed with image recognition AI seems like an obvious next step for SpaceX. Same satellite platform, shared components, same mass production, launch and deployment. Same laser links. It would be enormously valuable for many different applications.

A hosted payload option on the V2.0 sat. This would be an interesting move but at the moment pure speculation and off topic. Since the current product (Starlink buss sat with modifications) being sold to the DOD would not be a part of the Starlink network.

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/spacenews_inc/status/1325921366902759427

.@Airbus and Raytheon have filed protests with @USGAO challenging Space Development Agency contracts awarded to @L3HarrisTech and @SpaceX last month for eight missile-tracking satellites, putting the projects on hold until the dispute is resolved.
https://spacenews.com/airbus-raytheon-protest-space-development-agency-satellite-contract-awards/

[su27k]

Now that we know the true size of Gen2 Starlink, it raises the question: What bus are these missile warning satellites based on? They're clearly smaller than Gen2, but bigger than Gen1. I very much doubt SpaceX would design a new bus just for this contract, so what gives? They cut Gen2 in half for this contract? If so, what does this tell us about Gen2 platform?

[markbike528cbx]

Yes, this is surprising, I did not see this coming. I assumed they would bid on the communication layer, but the sensor layer? I assume it would go to some defense contractor, not SpaceX.

I wonder too if this signals an expansion of its business, that SpaceX is now aiming to become a generic satellite manufacturer and operator, something like LM's space division. LM gets $10B per year from its space division, so there's certainly money in this business.
>

At the risk of going slightly OT, but related to your business expansion point, ISTM the USAF may well be prompting SpaceX to take on a greatly expanded defense role.

>
>
And because the advanced manufacturing techniques that are critical for building NGAD were pioneered by the commercial sector, the program could open the door for new prime contractors for the aircraft to emerge — and perhaps give SpaceX founder Elon Musk a shot at designing an F-35 competitor.

“I have to imagine there will be a lot of engineers — maybe famous ones with well-known household names with billions of dollars to invest — that will decide starting the world’s greatest aircraft company to build the world’s greatest aircraft with the Air Force is exactly the kind of inspiring thing they want to do as a hobby or even a main gig,” Roper said.
>

None of that IMO is "right up Elon's street"
He loves the technology, but he is not doing it for the thrills, or the reputation, or for the future history books, but to make a positive contribution to mankind. I doubt he sees the USA as being immune to becoming a war-monger.
He has an overflowing bucket list of gigantic projects, and developing a war-fighter.... will be both far from the top of that list...
>

Musk is doing big projects to make money for Mars; StarLink, DoD launches. and pitching Starship to USSF and USAF. Is there a  higher paying DoD aerospace program than producing attack aircraft?

At 41:15 Elon declares
"The era of the fighter jet is over"


So, no enthusiasm for building something that you feel is obsolete and built to someone else's requirements.
Also, a fighter jet is way off the path to Mars.

[gongora]

They cut Gen2 in half for this contract? If so, what does this tell us about Gen2 platform?

Uh, you do realize that these satellites have a completely different payload than Starlink Gen2, right?

[su27k]

They cut Gen2 in half for this contract? If so, what does this tell us about Gen2 platform?

Uh, you do realize that these satellites have a completely different payload than Starlink Gen2, right?

Yes, but I'm not talking about the payload, I'm talking about the bus/platform. I reckon you can't just cut the platform in half without some serious engineering, regardless of the payload. Unless it is designed to do so from the start, which it might very well be since originally they kept the option of launching Gen2 on Falcon 9.

But now they're betting everything on Starship, would it still make sense for them to keep this compatibility with Falcon 9?

[gongora]

These satellites start launching in a few months.  They don't currently have anything to do with Starship.  The Tranche 1 satellites (which I assume SpaceX will bid on) are being launched through NSSL, and it will be a while before Starship is eligible for those contracts.

Changing the physical size of the bus is probably not that hard.  It's a handful of subsystems mounted to a frame.  Sizing the power and thermal systems for the payload is probably the biggest change.  Hopefully they'll add a little more redundancy on the SDA sats than they do on Starlink Gen1.

[edzieba]

It's possible the Tranche 0 birds were based on Starlink 2, before Starlink 2 was dedicated to Starship launch only an went on a growth spurt. It will be interesting to see if these 'Starlink 1.5' bus satellites are what is proposed for Tranche 1, or if that sees a much larger satellite (Starlink 2 as-it-is-now based) proposed, or no proposal at all and SpaceX just cut their losses to avoid being stuck building a dedicated bus just for the SDA.

[gongora]

I don't know why you think it would be a loss for SpaceX to build a different sized satellite for SDA if it's profitable.

[niwax]

I don't know why you think it would be a loss for SpaceX to build a different sized satellite for SDA if it's profitable.

How much engineering is there in the shape anyway, compared to thruster, torquers and electronics? Presumably they would have to change it to to accommodate the payload in any case.

[Asteroza]

Somewhere there was a satellite volume envelope drawing, showing the SDA sat to be quite beefy and not really of flatpack lineage.

[Redclaws]

Somewhere there was a satellite volume envelope drawing, showing the SDA sat to be quite beefy and not really of flatpack lineage.

I’d really like to see this to confirm it’s about these SDA satellites - wasn’t the whole idea these are Starlink derived?

[gongora]

"Starlink dervived" doesn't have to be the really thin flat-pack profile.  The bus includes flight computer, attitude control, position tracking, propulsion, power generation, thermal management.  That stuff can be put in different sized packages.  The SDA sats were still stackable but much thicker.  The sizing was in the discussion for the SDA Tranche 0 launch contract.

[gongora]

https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=47145.msg2147001#msg2147001

[su27k]

Sounds like SpaceX didn't bid on the follow on contract: https://spacenews.com/leidos-selected-by-northrop-grumman-to-supply-sensor-payloads-for-u-s-missile-tracking-satellites/

SpaceX’s Tranche 0 satellites are projected to launch in December. The company reportedly does not plan to bid on future tranches of the Tracking Layer so the new agreement with Northrop Grumman gives Leidos a long-term foothold in the program.

[zubenelgenubi]

When/how was Leidos revealed as the sensor subcontractor to SpaceX on the Tracking Layer Tranche 0 satellites?

There was no mention in the initial news from October 2020.

[su27k]

When/how was Leidos revealed as the sensor subcontractor to SpaceX on the Tracking Layer Tranche 0 satellites?

There was no mention in the initial news from October 2020.

It was mentioned in March this year: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=52704.msg2350682#msg2350682

[zubenelgenubi]

When/how was Leidos revealed as the sensor subcontractor to SpaceX on the Tracking Layer Tranche 0 satellites?

There was no mention in the initial news from October 2020.

It was mentioned in March this year: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=52704.msg2350682#msg2350682

Wow, I wouldn't have thought that that information would have remained confidential that long.