One space expert, with no skin in the NSSL game, opined that for the most part Blue Origin’s protest is “simply whining,” and characterized SpaceX’s lawsuit as “sour grapes.”

When new entities fail, it’s most often due to the fact they don’t do what they do better than their competition (differentiated value proposition is the business term) and they lack investment in talent and technology. But there are other challenges.

The Air Force has no choice but to pursue the current Launch Services Agreement. The plan is to have the three current launch partners — United Launch Alliance, Northrop Grumman and Blue Origin — work on a $2.3 billion effort to design three space launch variations. The first contract was awarded in October 2018. In 2020,… Keep reading →

What did Amazon founder, Washington Post owner and space entrepreneur Jeff Bezos tell the Air Force Association?

Don’t overthink it.
Don’t sweat the small stuff, but it’s not all small stuff.
On low stakes decisions, you should go fast, experiment, try and fail and try again; but on the big stuff — the irreversible decisions — for God’s sake, take your time.

WASHINGTON: In the vast swirling enterprise of global security space, the United States must come to terms with the tectonic shifts occurring as commercial companies come to dominate launch, the building of satellites and the sensors and software on which they depend, and figure out how to lead the way. That’s the conclusion of what… Keep reading →

Commercial space has many military applications, The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency relies heavily on commercial imagery supplied by DigitalGlobe satellites. The National Reconnaissance Office recently joined with NGA in something called the  Commercial GEOINT Activity to buy commercial satellite imagery. A raft of companies are talking about  building and operating satellites to provide imagery and other data.… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: Ash Carter made many reporters’ day this morning when he pithily put the case for the Pentagon to continue buying Russian RD-180 rocket engines until the United States has two tested and reliable launch providers capable of replacing the highly reliable and relatively cheap Atlas V built and operated by the United Launch Alliance. “We… Keep reading →

CAPITOL HILL: The Senate battle over Russian rockets keeps rocking. Senators Dick Durbin and Richard Shelby sent most of this morning’s defense appropriations hearing defending the Pentagon’s plan to keep using the cheap and technologically reliable but politically toxic RD-180 until an American-made replacement is ready, sometime around 2020-2021. Durbin and Shelby denounced the effort… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: It’s not officially official, but the head of Pentagon acquisition, Frank Kendall, says the Treasury Department has not found any reason for sanctions to be applied against the United Launch Alliance. “The preliminary indications from Treasury (Department) are that they do not apply,” Kendall told reporters after a lunch address to the Washington Space… Keep reading →

CAPITOL HILL: The war ground on today between San. John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and his colleague Sen. Richard Shelby on the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee. Shelby, knowing he had a policy friend in Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James, asked her about the Russian-made RD-180 rocket engine essential to US satellite launches… Keep reading →