ISAM
Stories about missions to service and assemble spacecraft in orbit, in addition to in-space manufacturing capabilities.
Space Force to Refuel GEO Satellite with Orbit Fab Tanker
The Space Force (USSF) has signed on to be one of the very first customers of a gas station in space. This week, in-space refueling company Orbit Fab won a $13.3M USSF contract to gas up geostationary (GEO) military satellites starting in 2025. Under the four-year contract, which was first reported by Bloomberg, the Colorado-based…
Orbit Fab Announces In-Space Refueling Prices
Prices at the pump may have cooled off and started coming down here on Earth, but topping off the tank in geostationary (GEO) orbit will still cost you a pretty penny. How much? Orbit Fab has announced a flat rate price of $20M for hydrazine fill-ups in GEO, which it aims to start in 2025.…
Redwire ($RDW) Reports Q2 2022 Results
Redwire ($RDW) reported Q2 2022 results before the market opened on Wednesday. The Jacksonville, FL-based space infrastructure company reported quarterly revenues of $36.7M (+14.2% YoY). Quick refresher: Commercial space powerbroker AE Industrial Partners hatched Redwire in late 2020 by merging Adcole Space and Deep Space Systems. Shortly thereafter, Redwire acquired Made in Space. The company…
Recapping the First Six Months of 2022 in Space
We’ve made it halfway through 2022. The year has flown by, but it’s been filled with big news and firsts for the space industry. Here’s our recap of the off-Earth goings-on during these last six months. Q1 The year started off with a bang as JWST unfolded successfully, reached its new home a million miles…
A Q+A with Redwire’s Andrew Rush
Image: Redwire Last month, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson visited Redwire Space’s headquarters in Jacksonville, FL, and said the city has become “the center for space technology.” To be fair, Nelson was a three-term Florida senator…so he’s not entirely impartial. Nonetheless, Redwire has helped make Jacksonville a space hub, with its corporate HQ and 37,000 square…
A Partnership Built to Combat Space Trash
OneWeb, Astroscale, the UK Space Agency, and ESA have partnered to launch a space junk servicer by 2024. The partnership comes with a €14.8 million ($15.8 million) investment that will allow Astrocale to advance its ELSA-M debris removal spacecraft from design through manufacturing and up to the satellite’s pre-integration phase. Once launched, ELSA-M will complete…
Benchmark Expands to Europe, Inks Propulsion Deal with UK’s Space Forge
Burlington, VT-based Benchmark Space Systems has formally expanded across the pond. The propulsion provider has pond-hopped across the Atlantic, not Lake Champlain, just to be clear. Driving the news…Benchmark has opened a new UK facility to serve the British and European markets. The Vermont startup has also signed a deal with Space Forge, a British…
Exclusive: Euroconsult on Space Logistics Markets
Euroconsult has put together the first edition of Space Logistic Markets, an extensive report on the growth of the in-orbit satellite services sector. The market research firm projects that these services will generate $4.4B in revenue by 2031, as the nascent technologies are proven and productized. The report identifies six markets:: Access to space Last-mile…
National Security Council States Need for OSAM Regulatory Framework
For a long time, on-orbit servicing, assembly, and manufacturing (OSAM) seemed just out of reach. Now, multiple startups have successfully demonstrated the technology, and many more are developing OSAM capabilities for refueling, repairing, and towing satellites around in orbit. But as this tech becomes more common, industry and policy voices have to consider potential dark…
Orbit Fab, AFRL Sign R&D Agreement
Orbit Fab and the US Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) have struck a partnership to share technology and R&D. What does that mean in practice? Per yesterday’s announcement, Orbit Fab will share the specs of RAFTI, its on-orbit refueling port, with AFRL. In return, AFRL will review Orbit Fab’s refueling tech, “advise on requirements and designs,”…
Varda Selects SpaceX for Launch
Yesterday, Varda Space Industries said it would launch its first microgravity factory as a Falcon 9 rideshare mission in early 2023. Founded last year and incubated at Founders Fund, Varda has raised $50+ million from VCs. In selecting SpaceX, Varda “immediately went with what we were comfortable with,”cofounder and president Delian Asparouhov told Payload. “It…
