SDA published a solicitation on Wednesday calling for “executive summaries” from vendors interested in performing 60-day studies focused on leveraging the PWSA and other capabilities into the “Iron Dome for America” — a sprawling effort to improve the United States’ defenses against advanced adversary missile threats. Trump’s executive order about the capabilities, issued Jan. 27, envisions a modernized, multilayer missile defense posture that would lean heavily on space-based systems, including the PWSA.

According to the solicitation, SDA is interested in executive summaries of “novel architecture concepts, systems, technologies, and capabilities” to accelerate future PWSA tranches or create new capability layers that would address other emerging requirements.

“SDA is soliciting executive summaries to study and provide recommendations for an Iron Dome for America architecture. These studies will inform SDA on concepts for such an architecture and how the PWSA could contribute,” the document stated.

Trump tasked Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth to develop a strategy that includes “a reference architecture, capabilities-based requirements and an implementation plan” and deliver it to the president by March 28.

While the directive calls for development of new space-based interceptors, it also pushes for expediting ongoing efforts — including “development and deployment of a custody later of the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture,” the EO states.

The PWSA is a planned mega-constellation comprising hundreds of satellites stationed in low-Earth orbit, with a transport layer for data relay and communications payloads and a tracking layer for missile warning and tracking sensors. The program is led by SDA, which intends to launch the satellites every two years in “tranches.”

Trump’s executive order gives the agency the green light to develop and deploy a custody layer within the PWSA architecture. Whereas tracking sensors focus on detecting potential missile threats to provide early warning, a custody layer maintains continuous surveillance on specific targets for “left-of-launch” missile defense.

Some of the agency’s ongoing efforts are already developing custody layer capabilities, such as the experimental Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter (FOO Fighter) program and the Gamma variant of SDA’s Tranche 2 Transport Layer. But the new call to industry goes a step further by asking for “opportunities to accelerate technically mature and novel phenomenologies into the PWSA Custody Layer and Tracking Layer.”

The solicitation also seeks input on ways to fast-track Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor (HBTSS) capabilities into the PWSA’s tracking layer, referring to sensors deployed on a constellation of demonstration satellites developed by the Missile Defense Agency that launched last year.

SDA has since decided to adopt the same types of sensors — which use high-fidelity, medium-field-of-view cameras suited for sending targeting data to interceptors — in some of its tracking layer payloads. 

Meanwhile, MDA published its own request for information last month that similarly sought industry feedback as to how it could contribute to Trump’s Iron Dome for America. The document asked industry to provide details on “new system-level capabilities, component concepts, upgrades to existing capabilities, or new [concepts of operations] across the kill chain” that could be delivered or demonstrated in two-year time periods, beginning no later than the end of 2026.

MDA’s RFI points to lines of effort outlined in Trump’s executive order, including acceleration and deployment of HBTSS. It does not, however, specify whether that would mean a follow-on program to operationalize the constellation or development of new medium-field-of-view cameras that would deploy on other satellites.

During a posture hearing in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday, head of North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and U.S. Northern Command Gen. Gregory Guillot underscored HBTSS as a key system for accurately tracking hypersonic missiles.

“We have some capability already that can detect intercontinental ballistic missiles, but those are fairly easy to track because of the ballistic profile,” Guillot said. “Whereas the hypersonics are both maneuverable and much faster, so getting the space-based capability to detect and track those that could cue defeat mechanisms in the end is imperative.”

SDA’s call to industry also outlines six other potential topics for the 60-day study: high-fidelity modeling, simulation and analysis capabilities; optimization of the PWSA’s transport layer in supporting missile defense; supply chain analysis; space and ground architectures; on-orbit sensor data processing, multi-sensor track fusion and low-latency dissemination; and software solutions to enable autonomous satellite operations.

According to the solicitation, the agency is considering awarding multiple vendors to conduct studies and “strongly encourages” submissions to be delivered no later than Feb. 28.

The post SDA solicits industry studies on potential capabilities for Trump’s Iron Dome for America appeared first on DefenseScoop.

As part of the HALO pool of pre-approved vendors, the selected businesses will now be able to compete for demonstrations and experimentation task orders that will support future tranches of SDA’s Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA). Each company has received an other transaction agreement (OTA) with an initial $20,000 to compensate for administrative and other expenses, according to the agency.

HALO task orders will focus on “rapid end-to-end mission demonstrations with launch of two identical satellites 12-18 months after award,” according to SDA.

The first prototype orders for HALO will be for the Tranche 2 Demonstration and Experimentation System (T2DES) project — intended to augment the Tranche 2 transport layer of communications and data relay satellites by demonstrating proliferation of future tactical data links and optical communications missions.

“Through HALO, SDA has an even faster and more flexible contracting mechanism in place to compete and award T2DES and other SDA demonstration projects,” SDA Director Derek Tournear said in a statement. “We believe HALO will also increase the pool of performers capable of bidding on future SDA programs, including participation in layers of future tranches.”

The PWSA is expected to comprise hundreds of satellites in low-Earth orbit (LEO) that carry critical warfighting capabilities for data transport and missile defense missions. SDA is fielding the constellation in tranches. It plans to launch the first operational batch of satellites in early 2025, with each subsequent tranche going on orbit every other year.

The agency is also leveraging the PWSA to test out emerging capabilities on orbit through a range of experimental projects, including T2DES and the Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter (FOO Fighter) program, among others.

Although SDA has not shied away from giving contracts to defense space newcomers, many of the awards for the PWSA have gone to well-known players like Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman. On the other hand, HALO looks to open doors for non-traditional and commercial companies to work with the agency and mature their technologies.

The companies chosen for the initial HALO vendor pool are: Airbus U.S. Space & Defense; Apex Technology; ST Space Mobile USA; Astro Digital; Capella Space; CesiumAstro; Firefly Aerospace; Geneva Technologies; Impulse Space; Kepler Communications; Kuiper Government Solutions; LeoStella; Momentus Space; Muon Space; NovaWurks; SpaceX; Turion Space; Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems; and York Space Systems.

Only firms that have been selected to participate in the vendor pool will be able to compete for the prototyping efforts under HALO. SDA expects to award multiple contracts each year for the effort and will review the pool periodically, according to the agency.

The post SDA establishes pool of 19 vendors for future space demonstration projects appeared first on DefenseScoop.

As part of the Proliferated Space Warfighter Architecture (PWSA), SDA is developing both a missile tracking and custody layer comprising hundreds of small satellites that will be stationed in low-Earth orbit (LEO) and able to sense and track advanced missile threats. The custody layer will be the main sensing capability that conducts ISR — a role for which the Defense Department has traditionally relied on partners in the National Reconnaissance Office or commercial industry.

“Moving forward, we see there are a lot of niche missions where the fine line between what is the tracking mission and what becomes the custody mission starts to get blurred,” Tournear said during a media roundtable at AFA’s Air, Space and Cyber conference. “If you’re going after more and more advanced, specialty-type missile systems, that’s tracking, but it can also be the custody mission.”

The Department of the Air Force has been working alongside members of the intelligence community to migrate some of its airborne moving target indication capabilities into the space domain. The Space Force this year received funding via the department’s new Quick Start authority to begin work for a program known as Long Range Kill Chains, a joint effort with the NRO to develop ground moving target indicator (GMTI) sensors and auxiliary payloads that will replace part of the E-8C JSTARS fleet.

SDA already has some programs underway that will experiment with fire-control solutions for address advanced missile threats, such as the experimental Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter (FOO Fighter) satellites and the Gamma variant of the Tranche 2 data transport layer, Tournear said.

While the agency does not have any near-term plans to work on a solicitation to industry for additional space-based ISR capabilities or programs, he added that it anticipates doing so shortly.

“In the future, we do see SDA building more sensing satellites to be able to do some of those niche missions that aren’t being done by others, to do that sensing aspect for some very, very hard targets and then be able to pull that into our transport layer,” he told reporters.

At the same time, SDA is gearing up to launch the first operational satellites within the PWSA in early 2025, Tournear said. The agency originally intended to put the Tranche 1 birds into orbit before the end of 2024, but it pushed the date back a few weeks due to supply chain problems experienced by some of the prime vendors’ subcontractors.

SDA is also adjusting its acquisition strategy for future tranches of transport and tracking satellites to allow more time for vendors to build their platforms. Previous contracts required industry to have systems ready to launch within two-and-a-half years of the contract date — a requirement that the organization is now extending to three years. Because of that, the agency has moved up when it plans to release solicitations for Tranche 3 PWSA satellites by several months, Tournear added.

“Two-and-a-half years for order to orbit is exceptionally difficult. I think that industry will get there, but it takes time to build up,” he told reporters. “Three years for order to orbit is what we’ve been seeing industry be able to do, even when they’re going as fast as they can.”

Updated on Sept. 17, 2024, at 8:10 AM: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that SDA has delayed solicitations for Tranche 3 PWSA satellites by several months. The agency has in fact moved up when it plans to release the solicitations. This story has been updated to reflect that.

The post SDA evaluating future role in ‘niche’ space-based ISR missions appeared first on DefenseScoop.

The organization released a request for information posted to Sam.gov on Friday. In a related announcement, SDA said it’s looking for input on its upcoming Tranche 3, which will “accelerate the proliferation of missile defense capability to provide low-latency fire control-quality data.” The agency plans to purchase around 54 platforms — or potentially more — from one or more vendors.

The new RFI is the first one published for Tranche 3 of SDA’s Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA), a planned constellation of hundreds of satellites that carry communications, data transport, and missile warning and tracking capabilities. The agency’s systems stationed in low-Earth orbit (LEO) are intended to be part of a larger, multi-orbit proliferated space architecture of missile warning and tracking capabilities — one of the Space Force’s top budget priorities.

The Tranche 3 tracking satellites will be equipped with infrared sensors and be launched across six orbital planes, according to SDA. The agency is targeting a launch date of no later than April 2029 for the first plane, according to a release.

Responses to the RFI are due July 29, after which the agency plans to publish a final request for proposal.

Iterating off of the previous two tranches, Tranche 3 will provide fire control-quality data for warfighters. Fire control systems are able to create high-fidelity tracking information for incoming threats that includes the exact position and time accuracy needed for a missile defense system to send an interceptor to defeat targets.

The satellites in PWSA’s tracking layer are a separate effort from SDA’s experimental Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter (FOO Fighter) program, which focuses on advancing next-generation fire-control capabilities for very specific threats.

In addition, the Tranche 3 tracking satellites will continue “to provide global, persistent indications, detection, warning, tracking, and identification of conventional and advanced missile threats, including hypersonic missile systems,” according to SDA. 

The first batch of 28 operational tracking satellites in Tranche 1 — built by Northrop Grumman and L3Harris — are scheduled to launch beginning in April 2025 and will offer “global mono coverage” for conventional missiles and hypersonic glide vehicles, an SDA fact sheet stated. 

Lockheed Martin, Sierra Space and L3Harris are contracted to develop satellites for Tranche 2, which will “complete near global stereo coverage” for missile warning and tracking missions while offering preliminary fire control capabilities, according to the fact sheet. The Tranche 2 satellites are scheduled to launch in 2027.

The post SDA sends notice to industry for next layer of missile tracking satellites appeared first on DefenseScoop.

In late 2023, the agency initiated contracting efforts for the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture Future Program (PFP) Ground Segment Integration (PGI) program — intended to provide ground infrastructure and resources for a range of experimental missions on orbit. After receiving feedback from industry, SDA has modified the program’s scope to concentrate on ground support for the Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter (FOO Fighter) satellites and other fire-control satellites.

Speaking to a small group of reporters Friday, Tournear explained that officials decided to change the PGI program because the initial requirements for the effort were too broad for industry to execute.

“It would have been very difficult for us to scope in a way that a vendor could properly bid,” he said. “If we wanted them to bid the ground support for everything from a small CubeSat-type demo that could have extremely high classification requirements, to something that was very open but a larger satellite, such as FOO Fighter, the requirements were significantly different.”

Now, the agency plans to award two separate contracts for fire-control ground infrastructure: the Advanced Fire Control Ground Integration (AFCGI) and the Advanced Fire Control Mission Integrator (AFCMI).

The vendor contracted for the AFCGI effort will be responsible for building out the developmental operations center at Redstone Arsenal, where they will provide the ground infrastructure, cloud hosting capabilities and IT resources for the ground entry points of the fire-control satellites, Tournear said.

At the same time, the AFCMI contract will include capabilities to fuse data from FOO Fighter and other fire-control satellites so that it can be passed off to warfighters, he noted.

“We were getting feedback from a lot of different vendors that the skill sets were significantly different enough that we would not be getting the best of breed if we mixed them together and essentially forced them to do different teaming agreements,” Tournear said. “They would make compromises on [things like], to get the best mission integrator they might not have the best ground integrator, or vice versa.”

SDA will post a notice to industry Friday detailing the restructuring, Tournear said. An official request for proposals for AFCGI is slated to be posted by mid-June, followed by a second RFP for AFCMI by the end of the summer.

The agency plans to award contracts for the effort starting in December, with the intention to have all of the necessary ground infrastructure and mission integration capabilities in place by summer of 2026.

SDA awarded Boeing-subsidiary Millennium Space Systems a $414 million contract in April to build eight satellites for the FOO Fighter program. The small constellation is intended to demonstrate next-generation fire-control capabilities — using sensors to create high-fidelity tracking data of advanced missile threats, such as hypersonic weapons, that includes the exact position and time accuracy needed to intercept and defeat them.

Because it is an on-orbit experimental program, the satellites are not directly part of SDA’s upcoming mega-constellation of missile tracking and data relay satellites known as the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA). The agency is currently targeting a launch date in the first quarter of fiscal 2027 for FOO Fighter.

As for the other demonstrations planned for the PFP effort that are not related to fire-control, the prime contractors will be responsible for supporting ground infrastructure and integration efforts moving forward, Tournear said. Upcoming contracts for these programs — like the Transport Layer Tranche 2 Demonstration and Experimentation System (T2DES) effort — will include additional ground support requirements, he noted.

“The ground efforts for those, we will treat more as experiments and we will have that be part of the scope for the space vehicle vendors themselves,” he explained. “Anything that is part of the PFP program that is very experimental by nature, the ground and operations will be done by the space vehicle vendors.”

The agency will have to modify some of the contracts already awarded, such as those to York Space Systems for the Tranche 1 Demonstration and Experimentation System (T1DES) program and Ball Aerospace for the National Defense Space Architecture Experimental Testbed (NExT) satellites. Tournear noted that SDA is already in discussions with both vendors to do so.

“They’re not significant changes, as the programs were already going to incorporate a good portion of the ground,” he said. “But as mentioned, since they’ll be providing their own ground entry points there will be some modifications.”

The post SDA restructuring ground support program for experimental sats to focus on fire-control missions appeared first on DefenseScoop.

The agency awarded the Boeing subsidiary an other transaction authority contract worth up to $414 million to build and deliver the platforms, which will be part of the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture’s (PWSA) Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter (FOO Fighter) program. The constellation is slated to be launched into orbit during the first quarter of fiscal 2027.

The satellites will be different from other vehicles in the PWSA’s tracking layer, in that they will be equipped with fire control-quality sensors to address advanced missile threats such as hypersonic weapons.

“The FOO Fighter program will provide an operational demonstration of fire control efforts separate from, but complementary to, our missile warning/missile tracking and missile defense efforts already underway in the tranches,” SDA Director Derek Tournear said in a statement. “We look forward to working with Millennium, a new teammate in the expanding marketplace of performers innovating to deliver the PWSA for the warfighter.”

Fire control systems are able to create high-fidelity tracking data of incoming threats that includes the exact position and time accuracy needed for a missile defense system to send an interceptor to defeat targets. Incorporating fire control-capable sensors is part of the Space Force’s larger plan to deploy a robust, multi-orbit missile defense architecture in space.

FOO Fighter will be include experimental and demonstration satellites that are independent from the PWSA tracking layer — part of a planned constellation of hundreds of platforms stationed in low-Earth orbit. Tournear has previously indicated that FOO Fighter will address very specific targets not addressed by the PWSA.

Although the initial request for proposals for the vehicles suggested that SDA was open to contracting with more than one vendor for FOO Fighter, Millennium Space Systems will build and deliver all eight satellites. The company will also provide the supporting ground system and perform mission operations, according to a press release from the contractor. 

“Our deep knowledge and understanding of this mission enabled us to engineer the right solution at the right cost, taking advantage of our common sensing vehicle and core components,” CEO Jason Kim said in a statement. “The mission engineering we’ve done is grounded in modeling and simulation exercises, allowing us to understand the payload and its applicability to mission execution.”

The post SDA taps Millennium Space Systems to build experimental FOO Fighter satellites appeared first on DefenseScoop.

The request is 8.5 percent less than the $4.7 billion that the agency asked for in fiscal 2024, marking a shift from the steady increase in funding SDA has received each year since it was founded in 2019. At press time, Congress has not passed a full-year 2024 appropriations bill and the Defense Department is operating under a continuing resolution.

The Space Development Agency is in charge of fielding a constellation of satellites in low-Earth orbit (LEO) known as the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA). The agency launched the first demonstration satellites in 2023 and wants to begin fielding operational space vehicles in two-year increments — referred to as tranches — beginning in late 2024. 

Recently published budget justification books show that SDA is moving away from development needed for Tranche 1 and is now focusing on production and delivery of the payloads. The agency also wants to ramp up work on Tranche 2, supporting ground infrastructure and battle management software, all while initiating work on Tranche 3.

According to a funding chart provided by SDA, most of the budget request is for research and development — around $3.9 billion, in total. The organization is also looking to buy four space launches for $357 million in fiscal 2025, which is less than the $529 million it asked for in FY ’24 to cover five launches. Rounding out the request is $56 million for operation and maintenance, per the budget documents.

Transport layer

SDA is asking for $1.4 billion in FY ’25 for its transport layer, which will carry data relay and communications capabilities and serve as the foundation for the Pentagon’s Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) warfighting concept. The agency plans to kick off acquisition for the Tranche 3 transport layer in fiscal 2025, with plans to award the first contracts by the end of the fiscal year, according to budget justification documents. 

The agency is asking for less this year than it did in fiscal 2024, mainly due to the Tranche 1 tracking layer systems moving from development and into production ahead of their launch in late 2024, budget documents state.

The Tranche 2 transport layer will also continue development through FY ’25 to prepare for launch beginning in 2027. The layer will be made up of three different satellite variants — dubbed Alpha, Beta and Gamma — that each have slightly different capabilities. 

SDA has already tapped Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman for the Beta variant, while York Space Systems and Northrop Grumman have been contracted for the Alphas. According to the budget request, the agency will award one more contract for Beta satellites and those for the Gamma variants, in fiscal 2024.

According to the justification documents, an additional $153.7 million will go towards building out the needed ground infrastructure and network capabilities for the PWSA’s growth, as well as developing and expanding the Battle Management Command, Control, and Communications (BMC3) Application Factory.

The budget request also includes a separate line that covers risk reduction, analyses, modeling and simulation, and technology maturation efforts for future PWSA tranches. That request — $425.2 million in FY ’25, which is less than the $472.6 million asked for last year — is dedicated to development of an “increasingly broad set of technologies (including alternative navigation solutions, advanced missile tracking, multi-INT fusion algorithms, integrated battle management algorithms, and next generation tactical data links),” the justification book said.

Not only does the money cover some work related to all planned tranches of transport satellites, it also funds some of the ground operations, SDA’s two experimental communications satellite programs, its National Defense Space Architecture Experimental Testbed (NExT) initiative and the PWSA Future Programs effort — which is integral to the agency’s plans to offer fire control capabilities.

However, budget documents state that funding was lowered in FY ’25 “due to realignment for higher U.S. Space Force priorities.” When asked to comment on the priority realignment, the Space Development Agency referred DefenseScoop to the Department of the Air Force, which did not immediately respond to inquiries.

During a meeting with reporters Friday prior to the official budget rollout, Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall said that both the Air and Space Forces modernization efforts were constrained by the Fiscal Responsibility Act, which caps defense spending in fiscal 2024 and fiscal 2025. For the Space Force’s budget — a majority of which is RDT&E funding — that meant having to make some “hard choices” about its priorities, he said.

“The net effects of the constraints that we have are that we’re not moving forward as fast as I’d like to in space, but we’re still moving forward,” Kendall said.

Tracking layer

The agency is asking for a little over $1.7 billion in R&D money in FY ’25 to fund the PWSA’s tracking layer of satellites that will be able to detect and track missile threats, as well as work on future fire-control capabilities. 

Creating a multi-orbit, proliferated space architecture of missile warning and tracking satellites is a top priority for the Space Force in its 2025 budget, with the lion’s share of the service’s request for research-and-development funds being allocated to programs that cover all orbital regimes.

The fiscal 2025 request is more than the $1.2 billion the agency asked for in FY ’24 for its missile warning and tracking efforts, which “reflects significant increase in Tranche 2 activities for space vehicle development, delivery, and test,” budget justification documents stated.

The agency is currently planning to launch 54 satellites for its Tranche 2 tracking layer, 48 of which will be for global warning and tracking missions and six that will offer preliminary fire control and missile defense capabilities. SDA awarded L3Harris, Lockheed Martin and Sierra Space contracts in January to build and deliver the payloads.

SDA plans to complete preliminary design review and critical design reviews of the space vehicles, initiate production and conduct other work on Tranche 2, which is scheduled to launch by April 2027. 

As for the Tranche 1 tracking layer, SDA will wrap up development and launch the birds into space beginning in April 2025. Money in fiscal 2025 will also be used to define the requirements and begin soliciting the Tranche 3 tracking layer, according to budget documents.

The request also outlines plans for its next-generation missile tracking and fire control satellites, the Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter (FOO Fighter) program. SDA wants to award a contract in fiscal 2024 and begin building the space vehicles for initial assembly and test during fiscal 2025. However, SDA Director Derek Tournear recently stated the agency will not be able to award a contract for the program until Congress approves funding for FY ’24, according to a report from Breaking Defense.

The post Space Development Agency would get $4.3B in FY ’25 budget request  appeared first on DefenseScoop.

According to a request for proposals posted to Sam.gov on Friday, the agency is looking for the “design, fabrication and launch” of four experimental satellites — or potentially eight — for its new Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter program, also known as FOO Fighter or F2. SDA has plans to award other transaction authority contracts to either one or two vendors as part of the effort.

The satellites will be used to “accelerate the ability to provide fire-control in support of global detection, warning, and precision tracking of advanced missile threats, including hypersonic missile systems,” the RFP stated. “F2 will demonstrate advanced missile defense capability by incorporating fire control-quality sensors into a scalable prototype constellation.”

The agency may also acquire additional satellites and payloads under OTAs in order to “ inform requirements and constellation design,” the RFP stated.

Responses are due Jan. 19, 2024.

SDA first issued a draft solicitation for FOO Fighter in July, indicating that it planned to purchase and deploy eight space vehicles equipped with electro-optical/infrared sensors from more than one vendor that would be launched by the second quarter of fiscal 2026.

While the number of satellites the agency wants for FOO Fighter hasn’t changed, the new RFP indicates that SDA is open to contracting just one vendor to build all eight satellites for the program. The timeline for launch has also been extended to no later than fourth quarter of fiscal 2026, according to the solicitation.

The FOO Fighter initiative is separate from the data transport, missile tracking and experimental satellites that will be part of SDA’s Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) in low-Earth orbit. SDA Director Derek Tournear has previously stated that the experimental FOO Fighter satellites will be used to test new technologies that could aid in missile defense and fill any capability gaps existing in the PWSA.

“FOO Fighter is independent. It’s more of an experimentation and demonstration satellite set to go after some very specific types of targets that are not addressed by the tracking constellation, which does the missile warning and the missile tracking and the missile defense,” Tournear said in July at the Air Force Summit hosted by the Potomac Officers Club.

If the FOO Fighter demos prove the technology is viable, SDA would then integrate a more operational set of satellites with Tranche 3 and Tranche 4 of the PWSA’s tracking layer — which are scheduled to launch in 2028 and 2030, respectively.

The post Space Development Agency issues first solicitation for experimental ‘fire-control’ satellites appeared first on DefenseScoop.

Earlier this month, the SDA released a draft solicitation on Sam.gov for the Fire-control On Orbit-support-to-the-war Fighter initiative, also known as FOO Fighter or F2.

The system “will accelerate the ability to provide fire-control in support of global detection, warning, and precision tracking of advanced missile threats, including hypersonic missile systems. The F2 system will demonstrate advanced missile defense capability by incorporating fire control-quality sensors into a prototype constellation,” per the special notice.

The agency plans to purchase and deploy eight experimental FOO Fighter satellites with electro-optical/infrared sensors using more than one vendor. They are expected to be launched no later than second quarter of fiscal 2026. The SDA may also acquire additional satellites and sensor payloads under other transaction authority agreements “to inform requirements and constellation design.”

However, the draft solicitation didn’t provide additional details, and it left unanswered questions about how the new systems would fit in with other elements of the so-called Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture and Missile Defense Agency (MDA) capabilities.

Before the draft solicitation was released, the Space Development Agency was already moving forward with plans for a series of tranches of data transport systems and missile tracking satellites that could help defend against advanced missile threats such as hypersonics.

“There’s a lot of confusion out there” about FOO Fighter, SDA Director Derek Tournear acknowledged during remarks at the Air Force Summit hosted by the Potomac Officers Club on Tuesday.

“We have our operational systems — our transport layer and our tracking layer. And then we have all our developmental and experimentation satellites” such as T1DES and T2DES, he explained. However, those experimental systems will be primarily focused on transport layer missions. The SDA wants to put up a separate constellation of experimental satellites to test out new technologies that could support missile defense.

Broadly for this mission set, “we’re relying on MDA to push a lot of the technology for the tracking and fire control … Working with MDA, we’ve folded in the fire control or the missile defense layer that does the fire controls. And that’s for wide field of view and our medium field of view at the top level. That essentially gets almost all of the missile warning, missile tracking [and] missile defense threats that you’d want to go after,” Tournear said.

However, “there’s a handful of … threats — that’s where it gets classified — that are not being addressed by those mainline programs. So, FOO Fighter is to look at … what would be the next-generation kind of these tracking constellations that could be fielded in the Tranche 3 or Tranche 4 time frame that would be able to provide actionable information against a different set of these threats. So that’s what FOO Fighter is. FOO Fighter is independent. It’s more of an experimentation and demonstration satellite set to go after some very specific types of targets that are not addressed by the tracking constellation, which does the missile warning and the missile tracking and the missile defense,” he added.

Tournear told DefenseScoop that he couldn’t discuss the specific threats that aren’t being covered by other systems or programs.

The SDA is planning to launch its Tranche 1 data transport and missile tracking satellites in 2024 and Tranche 2 in 2026. According to the agency’s plans, the FOO Fighter prototypes would go up separately in 2026.

Tranche 3 is slated to be launched in 2028 and Tranche 4 in 2030. If all goes well with the FOO Fighter demos, the SDA would be looking to “proliferate more for an operational system” in the Tranche 3 or Tranche 4 time frame, he told DefenseScoop at the conference.

SDA would hold another full and open competition to select vendors for an operational architecture if the agency decides to put up a more robust constellation, he noted.

During a meeting with reporters on the sidelines of the conference, Tournear was asked how the FOO Fighter satellites might integrate with MDA satellites and other systems.

“We’re working with MDA to make sure that we get the requirements folded in for a lot of those missions. So, the way we look at it is, all the satellites that will be doing the operational missile warning, missile tracking, missile defense missions will be flown and operated by the Space Force — and SDA is building all those out. But MDA is the one that owns that overall mission space. So we need to make sure that all of the requirements that are feeding back into their weapons systems are folded into what we’re building to do the sensing. And so that’s how we’re working pretty closely with MDA,” he said.

The post Pentagon’s FOO Fighter satellites to focus on ‘handful’ of missile threats not covered by other programs, SDA director says appeared first on DefenseScoop.