U-Space Selects Skynopy to Support Multiple Missions
French satellite builder U‑Space has signed two agreements with ground‑station‑as‑a‑service provider Skynopy. The deals cover ground‑segment support for the existing SOAP and PANDORE LEO demonstrators and a joint effort to develop X‑band communications for future U‑Space missions, funded by ESA’s PUSH program. U‑Space, which can now produce a satellite per day, sees Skynopy as the preferred partner for high‑throughput, mission‑critical data links. The partnership is expected to scale as U‑Space’s constellation expands beyond its current three satellites.
Guetlein: CBO Is ‘Not Estimating What We’re Building’
U.S. missile‑defense program Golden Dome's leader Gen. Michael Guetlein criticized the Congressional Budget Office’s $1.2 trillion cost estimate, saying it vastly overstates the $185 billion budget he presented. Guetlein argued the CBO relied on legacy‑technology costs and lacked insight into the program’s...
Exclusive: LEAP Launches Its First Rocket
LEAP, a Colorado‑based startup, completed the inaugural flight of its Bullfrog suborbital vehicle, reaching roughly 40 km altitude from Mojave’s Friends of Amateur Rocketry pad. The test validated a dual‑mode rocket engine, low‑cost proprietary fuel tanks and a rapid, containerized launch...
Exobiosphere, Voyager Partner on ISS Mission
Exobiosphere has signed a contract with Voyager Technologies Europe to launch its Orbital High‑Throughput Screening Device on the International Space Station. The automated mini‑lab fits into standard mid‑deck lockers, keeps organ cells alive and delivers therapeutics without astronaut intervention, promising...
Star Catcher Closes $65M Series A
Star Catcher announced a $65 million Series A round, lifting its total capital to $88 million. The round was led by B Capital and co‑led by Shield Capital and Cerberus Ventures, with board seats for former Space Force chief Jay Raymond and senior energy...
Fenix Space Flies Tow-Launch Prototype
Fenix Space, a California launch startup, finished a week‑long test campaign of its alpha tow‑launch prototype, proving the vehicle can separate from a carrier aircraft and execute autonomous flight maneuvers. The system uses a horizontal‑lift approach, taking off and landing...
Aetherflux Rebrands, Pivots Business—And Raises $275M
Aetherflux has rebranded as Cowboy Space Corporation and closed a $275 million Series B round at a $2 billion valuation. The company is pivoting from a sole focus on a solar‑power small‑sat constellation to a dual strategy that adds a dedicated launch vehicle...
SOCOM Taps SkyFi to Build Tactical EO Imagery Tools
U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) has selected commercial EO provider SkyFi to build a prototype sovereign intelligence platform that streamlines access to geospatial imagery for troops. The Phase 1 effort includes an Android Tactical Assault Kit plug‑in that lets operators task...
HawkEye 360 Raises $416M in IPO
HawkEye 360 raised $416 million in its NYSE IPO, pricing 16 million shares at $26 each and achieving a $2.4 billion valuation. The offering, led by Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, includes a 30‑day green‑shoe option for an extra 2.4 million shares, potentially adding...
SatVu Positions Thermal Imaging as the Missing EO Layer
SatVu, the UK thermal‑imaging startup, closed a £30 million (≈$35 million) round in February and this week announced first‑light data from its second satellite, HotSat‑2, launched on SpaceX’s Transporter‑16 rideshare. The thermal images captured activity at an oil refinery in Cuba before...
South Korea Pushes to Commercialize Quantum Research
South Korea unveiled the Open Quantum Testbed Advancement and Expansion Project, a government‑backed initiative to move quantum communication technologies such as Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) from laboratory prototypes to commercial products. The program invites industry consortia to submit proposals across...
Astranis Raises $450M+, Including $300M Series E
Astranis announced a $300 million Series E round co‑led by Snowpoint Ventures and Franklin Templeton, lifting its valuation to roughly $2.8 billion. The round also attracted Andreessen Horowitz, BlackRock, Baillie Gifford and Fidelity, and was complemented by a $155 million delayed‑draw credit facility from...
Scout Space Closes $18M Series A
Scout Space announced an $18 million Series A round led by Washington Harbour Partners, aimed at scaling its satellite‑sensor business. The funding will finance a 2,600‑sq‑ft manufacturing plant in Northern Virginia and nearly double the workforce to over 50 employees within 18...
Commerce Aiming to Open Novel Space Applications This Summer
The U.S. Department of Commerce’s Office of Space Commerce (OSC) unveiled a one‑stop licensing framework that lets companies submit a single application for novel space missions—ranging from asteroid mining to in‑space refueling—to be shared with the FAA, FCC and other...
Bridenstine Takes Over as Quantum Space CEO
Former NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine has been appointed chief executive of Quantum Space, a satellite‑maneuvering firm. Bridenstine says the role lets him return to national‑security work, leveraging his military and congressional experience. Quantum’s flagship Ranger vehicle can both refuel other...
Anduril Names Its SBI Team For Golden Dome
Anduril announced its partner team for the Pentagon’s Golden Dome Space‑Based Interceptor (SBI) program, naming Impulse Space, Inversion Space, K2 Space, Sandia National Labs and Voyager Technologies. The five firms join eleven other prime contractors working on the missile‑defense architecture....
ESA Taps Edge Aerospace for Space Cloud Contract
Edge Aerospace, a Luxembourg‑based in‑space computing startup, has been awarded an ESA Space Cloud contract to develop an architecture and use‑case roadmap for orbital data centres. The study will assess commercial viability and identify civil, commercial and defence applications for...
Payload Field Guide: Lunar Rovers
NASA’s March Ignition event announced a shift toward faster, scalable lunar rover delivery to support a permanent human presence. Private firms such as Astrobotic, Lunar Outpost, ispace, Intuitive Machines, Venturi Astrolab, and JAXA‑Toyota are racing to field rovers that can...
Space Nuclear Execs Cheer the FY27 Budget Proposal
NASA’s FY27 budget proposal earmarks roughly $675 million for space nuclear initiatives, signaling a strategic shift toward nuclear power for lunar and Mars missions. The plan includes $438.8 million for Mars‑focused fission reactors, $135.3 million for radioisotope power systems, and $100.9 million for infrastructure...
CATALYST Unveils Its Sat Product for City Skylines
Catalyst, a PCI Geomatics brand, launched UrbanSAR, a satellite‑based service that measures millimeter‑scale building movements floor‑by‑floor using interferometric SAR from multiple satellites. The system can reveal structural shifts up to 30 mm on high‑rise rooftops—areas missed by ground monitoring. Catalyst says...
York Space Systems to Acquire ALL.SPACE for $355M
York Space Systems announced a $355 million cash‑and‑stock acquisition of terminal maker ALL.SPACE. The deal includes $155 million in cash and up to 5.9 million newly issued shares, making ALL.SPACE an indirect wholly‑owned subsidiary. The purchase follows York’s March acquisition of Orbion Space...
Orbital Data Center Competitive Landscape
The Payload Pro report maps the emerging competitive landscape for orbital data centers, a nascent market that aims to host storage and compute resources in low‑Earth orbit. It profiles incumbents such as SpaceX’s Starlink‑linked data pods, Amazon’s Project Kuiper infrastructure,...
DPhi’s Second Demo Brings Compute Space to Orbit
Swiss startup DPhi Space demonstrated in‑orbit artificial‑intelligence compute by running Liquid AI’s large language model on its Clustergate‑2 payload, hosted on a Momentus Vigoride 7 satellite. The LLM described an Earth observation image without transmitting the data to ground, proving...
Golden Dome Will Use COTS Parts, Space Execs Say
Industry leaders said the Pentagon’s Golden Dome missile‑defense program will lean heavily on commercial‑off‑the‑shelf (COTS) satellite parts to keep costs down. Apex Space CEO Ian Cinnamon, Impulse Space COO Eric Romo and K2 Space CEO Karan Kunjur made the remarks...
Isaacman Continues to Defend Budget Cuts to Congress
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman defended a Trump‑era proposal to slash $5.6 billion from the agency’s FY2026 budget, arguing the cuts will sharpen focus on returning to the Moon. He highlighted a $10 billion appropriation in the One Big Beautiful Bill and a...
True Anomaly Closes $650M Series D
True Anomaly closed a $650 million Series D round, valuing the space‑defense startup at $2.2 billion. The financing, co‑led by Eclipse and Riot Ventures and supplemented by a $50 million debt facility, brings new capital from Paradigm, Atreides, G Squared, the Private Shares Fund and...
Meta Secures Overview Energy Space Solar Power Capacity
Meta has signed an agreement to secure up to 1 GW of power from Overview Energy’s planned solar‑beaming satellite system. The move follows Meta’s earlier deals for 6.6 GW of nuclear capacity and reflects growing pressure on terrestrial grids from AI‑driven data‑center...
Pentagon Taps 12 Companies for Golden Dome SBI Tech
The Pentagon announced 20 Other Transaction Authority contracts worth up to $3.2 billion for the space‑based interceptor (SBI) component of the Golden Dome missile‑defense system. Twelve companies, ranging from legacy defense contractors to emerging space startups, received the awards, which were...
Astra Targets Golden Dome With Small Rockets, Says CEO Chris Kemp
Astra is pitching its small, single‑use rockets as realistic targets for the Pentagon’s Golden Dome missile‑defense tests, arguing that expendable vehicles better simulate actual threats and can lower testing costs. CEO Chris Kemp says the program will drive scale and...
Trump Taps Space Execs For Military Space Roles
President Donald Trump has nominated Raytheon vice president Erich Hernandez‑Baquero as the Air Force assistant secretary for space acquisition and integration, and V2X chief growth officer Roger Mason as the next head of the National Reconnaissance Office. Both appointments require...
Astrobotic Hotfires Engine That Could Power Moon Missions
Astrobotic Technology announced a record‑setting 300‑second hot‑fire of its Chakram rotating detonation rocket engine (RDRE) at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. The test, completed on a budget of less than $1.5 million, demonstrated continuous operation of one of two prototypes. Astrobotic...
Orbital Vs. Terrestrial Data Center Cost Analysis
A new analysis from Payload compares the total cost of operating orbital data centers with traditional terrestrial facilities. While space‑based hubs promise lower latency and greener power sources, they require roughly 2.5 times higher capital expenditures and face steep regulatory...
UNIVITY Raises €27M Series A
UNIVITY, a French VLEO connectivity startup, closed a €27 million ($31.6 million) Series A round led by Blast Club, Expansion Venture Capital, and Bpifrance’s Deep Tech fund. The capital will fund the uniShape demo, deploying two 5G‑enabled satellites in very‑low‑Earth‑orbit (~375 km) to validate...
Lawmakers Promise to Reject Proposed NASA Cuts—Again
Lawmakers on the House Science, Space and Technology Committee vowed to block the Trump administration’s FY2027 NASA budget request, which trims the agency’s funding to $18.8 billion—a $5.6 billion cut from the FY2026 level. The bipartisan group argued the reductions jeopardize the...
Tracking Sats From the Sea
The U.S. Navy is evaluating the placement of Space Development Agency (SDA) satellite‑tracking technology on its ships, turning vessels into mobile space‑domain awareness platforms. Rear Adm. Karrey Sanders argues that sea‑based sensors are harder to target and can view satellites...
Payload Field Guide: Golden Dome
The Golden Dome missile‑defense program, modeled on Israel’s Iron Dome, was rebranded by President Donald Trump in May 2025 and is overseen by Space Force Gen. Michael Guetlein. Valued at $175 billion, the initiative includes a $151 billion IDIQ contract pool that...
Opportunities Beyond the Moon Opened by CLPS
NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program will launch monthly uncrewed lunar missions starting next year, opening a steady rideshare market for private space firms. Astroforge, an asteroid‑mining startup, says its $3.5 million deep‑space spacecraft could only reach its target by...
Economics of Orbital Data Centers Report: Part 1
Payload’s new report examines the economics of placing data centers in orbit as terrestrial infrastructure strains under rising power demand and cooling costs. It highlights that global data‑center electricity consumption could reach 500 TWh by 2030, while launch prices have dropped...
Latvia To Join Artemis Accords Today
Latvia signed the Artemis Accords at NASA headquarters, becoming the 62nd nation to join the non‑binding framework for lunar cooperation. The signing fulfills a pledge made in October and brings all three Baltic states—Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia—under the agreement. The...
SpaceX Won A Mars Mission That Might Get Cancelled
NASA announced that SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy has been selected to launch ESA’s Rosalind Franklin rover to Mars, with a contract worth about $175.7 million and a target launch window in late 2028. The award provides a rare deep‑space mission for Falcon Heavy after...
Rocket Lab Enters the Thruster Market with Gauss
Rocket Lab unveiled Gauss, a Hall‑effect electric thruster designed for in‑orbit maneuvering, marking its entry into the spacecraft propulsion market. The thruster complements the company’s expanding component business and leverages its experience with reaction wheels and star trackers. Simultaneously, Rocket...
Axiom Space’s Suit Set to Fly in 2027
Axiom Space announced that its next‑generation EVA suit will receive an in‑space qualification flight in 2027, positioning it for either the Artemis III lunar landing or a test on the International Space Station. The suit shares a common architecture for...
Voyager Technologies Wins Its First Private ISS Mission
Voyager Technologies announced it has secured NASA’s seventh private astronaut mission (PAM), marking the company’s first such contract and targeting a launch no earlier than 2028. The award follows recent wins by competitors Vast, which will fly its inaugural PAM...
ORBX ETF Launches Amid Wave of Space Tech IPOs
Global X launched the Global X Space Tech ETF (ticker ORBX), a passively managed fund that tracks companies earning more than half of their revenue from space technology. The ETF will rebalance up to four times a year to add...
Kepler, Astrolight to Test ESA’s ‘Fiber in the Sky’
The European Space Agency has chosen a Kepler Communications‑led team to test its HydRON "fiber in the sky" optical network. Kepler will launch a satellite in 2027 carrying Astrolight’s ATLAS‑X laser communications terminal, which will operate as a third‑party user...
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman On Artemis, Budget, And Establishing a Lasting Space Vision
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman defended the White House’s FY2027 budget proposal, emphasizing fiscal responsibility amid growing congressional scrutiny. He highlighted Artemis II’s largely successful flight, noting a pristine heat shield and only minor system glitches such as a small helium leak....
CLD Companies Say NASA Is Wrong. NASA Says Prove It.
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman challenged commercial low‑Earth‑orbit (CLD) station builders to prove a viable market after the agency announced it doubts commercial demand and plans to purchase a core module for the ISS. Axiom Space and Vast submitted feedback arguing...
Slingshot Introduces AI-Powered Portal Platform
Slingshot Aerospace launched the Slingshot Portal, an AI‑driven platform that consolidates data from its Global Sensor Network, government tracking feeds, orbital object catalogs, and customers' proprietary sources. The portal delivers near‑real‑time monitoring, anomaly detection, and maneuver planning within a single...
ICON Prime Launches, Led By Former TX Rep
Robotic construction firm ICON announced a new unit, ICON Prime, dedicated to serving the Pentagon and NASA. The unit will be led by former Texas Congressman and CIA officer Will Hurd, who aims to translate the company's $360 million in existing...
Exclusive: Vast Debuts Flight Suit For Haven-1, Private Astronaut Missions
Vast announced its first flight suit designed for crew members of the upcoming Haven‑1 private space station and its ISS‑bound private astronaut missions. The modular garment can be worn as a separate jacket and pants or zipped into a traditional...