Tag Archives: SpaceX

NASA has selected SpaceX and its Falcon 9 rocket to provide the launch service for the agency’s TRACERS (Tandem Reconnection and Cusp Electrodynamics Reconnaissance Satellites) mission. The mission comprises a pair of small satellites that will study space weather and how the Sun’s energy affects Earth’s magnetic environment or magnetosphere.

Prewitt Ridge, the requirements management and digital thread company, announced on the 12th of September that it has raised $4.1 million in seed funding. The company will use this to accelerate the growth of its digital engineering platform that enables team building products to move faster. The round was led by Squadra Ventures, with participation from Stage Venture Partners, Aurelia Foundry, Wonder Ventures, Haystack, Acequia, TechStars, GC&H and leading angel investors. 

Sidus Space, a Space and Data-as-a-Service company, have confirmed its plan to reallocate two LizzieSats to launch on an upcoming Bandwagon mission with SpaceX.  In addition, the updated LizzieSat constellation configuration will advance cutting-edge Low Earth Orbit data collection and provide enhanced orbital flexibility for Government and commercial customers.

Space Tango, a provider of automated microgravity solutions for research and manufacturing, announces the appointment of S. Sita Sonty as its new Chief Executive Officer (CEO), effective September 1, 2023. Sonty succeeds Co-Founder and current President, Twyman Clements. Prior to joining Space Tango, Sonty led the space industry practice for the Boston Consulting Group. She was also the Head of Human Spaceflight Sales at SpaceX, where she executed the first private spaceflight sale on the Crew Dragon on a Lower Earth Orbit Free Flyer and to the International Space Station.

Lockheed Martin has successfully deployed ten of its satellites into low-Earth orbit (LEO) in support of the Space Development Agency's (SDA) Tranche 0 Transport Layer (T0TL) mission. SDA's T0TL is a proliferated LEO constellation that will demonstrate low-latency communication and provide a resilient network of integrated capabilities. The company's 10 small satellites successfully separated from the launch vehicle and are now in orbit.

As reviewed in Part 3, LambdaVision, based in Farmington, Connecticut, USA, was founded in 2009 by its President and CEO Dr. Nicole Wagner and co-founder chemist Jordan Greco. Dr. Robert Birge, distinguished chair in chemistry at the University of Connecticut, a renowned expert in the incorporation of light-activated proteins into biomolecular electronic and therapeutic applications, is a Member of the Board of Directors of the company.

Muon Space and Exolaunch have signed a multi-launch agreement (MLA) to deploy Muon Space’s first three constellation satellites during SpaceX Transporter missions. Muon Space’s first satellite, MuSat-1, launched in June via Exolaunch on SpaceX’s Transporter-8 mission from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

RIKEN, Japan’s largest research institution, Mitsui Bussan Aerospace, and Kongsberg NanoAvionics announced on the 7th of August their collaboration on the NinjaSat1 X-ray observation mission. The aim of this two-year mission in low Earth orbit (LEO) is to observe X-ray photons from bright X-ray objects in the universe. The NinjaSat team intends to observe black holes and neutron stars that brighten suddenly in X-rays and coordinate with on-ground optical observatories to study how matter accretes to these compact objects. 

The US Space Force announced on the 24th of July that it has selected 16 companies that will compete for low Earth orbit satellite service contracts. The vendors will compete for up to $900 million worth of task orders over the next five years under an indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contract. Each contractor has been guaranteed $2,000. 

Scientists have used the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) to observe low-frequency radio waves from satellites in large constellations for the first time. For a study published in the Astronomy & Astrophysics journal, scientists from a number of leading research institutions used the LOFAR telescope centred in the Netherlands to observe 68 Starlink satellites made by SpaceX.