“It’s not supposed to be even touched until 2027. Now they’re saying that’s probably too long. So let’s talk about—is now the time, based on what’s happening in the world,” Col. Jonathan Whitaker told Payload on the sidelines of Space Symposium.
They focus on tech ranging from high-res imaging, mission planning, non-Earth imaging, and carrying and dispensing small sats in orbit (not unlike how an aircraft carrier operates at sea).
While the station may look more luxurious than the industrial ISS it’s gunning to replace, CEO Max Haot was clear that the touches of comfort weren’t designed with billionaire vacationers in mind.
Blue Skies Space, a UK-based startup, will design a Moon-orbiting cubesat constellation to search for the oldest signal from the ancient universe.
“In the aerospace industry, costs get passed along into the marketspace…Is the market going to bear that cost increase? Right now, it’s a lot of philosophical kinds of uncertainty,” said Ed Dodd, VP of business development at Cofactr, a procurement and logistics management startup.
Firefly will conduct a responsive space mission for DoD as early as 2027, which will include capabilities such as conducting space domain operations in LEO.
Many sectors of the space industry predict that AI and machine learning will help process the unprecedented amount of data collected in orbit. The ODC nodes will help enable that, according to Axiom.
Index Ventures and Interlagos led the round, which also included participation from Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, NEA, and actor Jared Leto, among others.
CEOs asked lawmakers to support block buys in CLPS 2.0 to give industry the opportunity to purchase materials in advance, providing certainty in both the supply chain and the workforce.
“I think the rubber is really going to meet the road,” Umbra COO Todd Master told Payload. “A lot of interesting tech got put into space. The question now is what of that data actually is needed by customers—that customers are willing to pay for?”
“I’m very hopeful that the case the Space Force marks means a lot of that money will come back into our budget,” he said, adding that the Trump administration’s “Golden Dome” missile defense proposal could actually lead to national security space programs getting more resources.
“Our nation is at a turning point where we face international competition from China, we have the opportunity to promote international cooperation with our partner nations, and we are witnessing radical change in the commercial space sector,” the 28 astronauts wrote in the letter, which was shared last weekend. “We believe that Jared Isaacman is uniquely qualified to lead NASA at this critical juncture.”
