Space Force bets on commercial entrants in $4B satcom contest

American warfighters need jam-proof communications, and the Space Force is planning to spend hundreds of millions to ensure they have them.

As part of that effort, the service established the Protected Tactical Satcom program to build out secure battlefield communications via satellites. The Space Force has already awarded contracts to defense primes Boeing and Northrop Grumman to develop prototype payloads for satellites heading to far-away geostationary orbit.

Now, the program is entering a new phase. On Tuesday, the Space Force awarded five additional contracts for the design and demonstration of purpose-built satellites to provide jam-resistant comms to tactical forces. The winners include previous winners Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Viasat, and Intelsat, plus a relative newcomer: Astranis, a venture-backed startup based in San Francisco. (Intelsat will buy its satellite bus from K2 Space, another venture-backed startup.)

The initial awards are relatively small, totaling $37.3 million combined. But the program has a $4 billion award ceiling, so the winners could sign on to a much more lucrative defense deal.

Each firm will develop its architectures through January 2026. After that, the Space Force will select one design and award an additional contract for the first satellite, with a launch planned in 2028. Additional production awards will be doled out, also in 2028.

The PTS-G contracts are a notable departure from how the military has historically procured geostationary satellites, which have typically had extremely long timelines from contract award to launch, and would cost hundreds of millions to over a billion dollars per spacecraft.

In contrast, the Space Force is clearly trying to leverage the speed of commercial entrants and encourage competition by selecting multiple vendors for the initial phase of the program.

“Our PTS-G contract transforms how SSC acquires SATCOM capability for the warfighter,” program executive officer Cordell DeLaPena Jr. said in a news release. “The incorporation of commercial baseline designs to meet military capability significantly enhances the Space Force’s speed and efficiency to add capability to meet emerging threats.”