East African Countries Plan Regional Satellite Launch
Ministers from Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan and Uganda have agreed to move forward with the Northern Corridor Regional Communication and Broadcasting Satellite Initiative (NCRCBSI), a joint effort to launch a satellite that will broaden communication and broadcasting services across East Africa. The four governments will fund a 12‑18‑month feasibility study, with launch likely from an established foreign spaceport such as Baikonur or the Guiana Space Centre. The move comes as Africa’s overall space economy expands, reaching $25 billion in 2024 and attracting $828 million in government spending this year. Regional leaders see the satellite as a step toward reducing dependence on external assets and accelerating digital infrastructure development.
Shenyang Institute of Automation Proposes Carbon Fiber/PEEK 3D Printing and Welding for On-Orbit Structures
China’s Shenyang Institute of Automation (SIA CAS) announced a new on‑orbit manufacturing method that merges pultrusion molding with laser transmission welding of carbon‑fiber reinforced PEEK composites. The technique produces high‑strength, lightweight tubular units and 3D‑printed PEEK joints that can be...
Louisiana State Senator: Two Unnamed Aerospace Companies Are Bidding for Major Land Purchase
Louisiana State Senator Bob Hensgens confirmed that two unnamed aerospace companies are in talks with landowners about purchasing a 136,000‑acre (over 200 sq mi) Exxon‑owned parcel on the Gulf Coast. The land, located in Vermilion and Cameron parishes, has been speculated as...
Paraguay Becomes the 67th Nation to Sign Artemis Accords
Paraguay signed the Artemis Accords on July 9, becoming the 67th nation to join the U.S.-led space partnership. The addition follows a recent wave of smaller countries signing after the Artemis‑2 lunar flyby. NASA’s Jared Isaacman highlighted the accords’ focus on...
Rocket Lab Enters Golden Dome Missile Defense Program with Raytheon
Rocket Lab Corp., in collaboration with defense contractor Raytheon, has been chosen by the U.S. Space Force to demonstrate advanced capabilities for the Space Based Interceptor (SBI) program, a cornerstone of the Golden Dome missile‑defense architecture. The selection positions Rocket...
The Charred Hull of Artemis 2's Orion | Space Photo of the Day for May 8, 2026
NASA’s Artemis 2 mission returned four astronauts safely to Earth after a historic 10‑day lunar flyby, the first crewed trip beyond low‑Earth orbit since Apollo 17. The Orion capsule, nicknamed “Integrity,” endured re‑entry temperatures up to 5,000 °F, scorching its exterior while the...
A New Race to the Moon Puts Earth-to-Moon Connectivity in the Spotlight
The renewed race to the Moon is spotlighting Earth‑to‑Moon communications as a critical enabler for upcoming Artemis missions and commercial lunar ventures. NASA’s Ignition Initiative will invest $20 billion over seven years to build sustainable habitats, rovers and nuclear power on...
SmallSat Europe Speaker Focus: Johannes Galatsanos, Diffraqtion
Diffraqtion, a quantum‑imaging startup spun out of MIT and the University of Maryland, announced a $4.2 million pre‑seed round that includes a DARPA Small Business Innovation Research Phase‑II contract. The company’s quantum camera promises up to 20‑times higher resolution and 1,000‑times...
Can Pakistan Make Its Space Program Great Again?
Pakistan has selected two Pakistan Air Force pilots for astronaut training in China, paving the way for the nation’s first citizen to fly aboard China’s Tiangong space station in late 2026. In parallel, SUPRCO has launched five indigenous satellites between...
RSAT Space and INNOSPACE Sign MOU for North American Launch and Integration Services
Montreal‑based RSAT Space and South Korean launch provider INNOSPACE signed a Memorandum of Understanding to jointly pursue satellite launch and space‑system contracts across North America. The deal pairs INNOSPACE’s HANBIT‑Nano small‑sat launcher, capable of delivering up to 90 kg to a...
Artemis II Crew Eyes Meteoroid Impact Flashes
During its lunar flyby, NASA’s Artemis II crew observed brief meteoroid impact flashes on the Moon’s far side, a phenomenon that onboard cameras struggled to capture. The Orion spacecraft carried 31 cameras to document the mission, yet rapid flashes evaded imaging...
UAE Space Agency Drives Public-Private Collaboration at MIITE 2026
At the fifth Make it in the Emirates (MIITE) 2026 forum, the UAE Space Agency showcased its push to embed private firms into the national space agenda outlined in the Space Strategy 2031. The agency highlighted the expansion of Space Economic...
Rocket Lab Announces Large Launch Contract and Plans to Acquire Space Robotics Company
Rocket Lab announced its largest ever launch contract, securing five Neutron and Electron missions for a confidential customer between 2026 and 2029. The deal exceeds the previous $190 million record, underscoring rising demand for the company’s medium‑lift capabilities. Rocket Lab also...
Your Kids Asked the Artemis Astronauts Questions. They Answered.
NASA’s Artemis II crew completed a ten‑day lunar flyby, venturing farther than any human and spending time on the moon’s far side. In a kid‑focused interview, astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen answered questions about the mission,...
Meet Rassvet, Russia’s Answer to Starlink
Russia’s Bureau 1440 launched the first 16 Rassvet broadband satellites on 23 March 2026, marking the start of a planned low‑Earth‑orbit constellation. The government‑backed project aims for 300‑350 satellites by 2030, delivering up to 1 Gbps speeds and 70 ms latency across the nation....
Bringing Low Earth Orbit (LEO) Satellite Connectivity to Scotland’s Rail Network
Nomad Digital is installing Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite‑based Wi‑Fi on ScotRail’s Class 222 intercity fleet, covering routes such as Glasgow‑Edinburgh‑Aberdeen‑Inverness. The solution reduces reliance on terrestrial mobile networks, delivering more consistent connectivity in rural and regional areas. The rollout is...
GCT Taps Satellite Partner to Speed 5G Rollout
GCT Semiconductor has signed a reference platform agreement with a major satellite communications provider to speed the creation of 5G user equipment that works across satellite and terrestrial networks. The deal builds on an earlier chipset licensing pact and delivers...
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...
Zimbabwe Starlink Subscriptions Now The Largest In Southern Africa
Starlink’s Zimbabwe subscriber base hit 67,057 in Q4 2025, a 31.6% quarterly jump and 117% growth since early 2025, making the country the Southern African leader in satellite internet. The surge lifted Zimbabwe to over half of the region’s Starlink users,...
Infineon Rad-Hard Chips Performed Flawlessly on Artemis II
NASA’s Artemis II mission completed a 10‑day crewed flight that set a new record for distance from Earth, while simultaneously proving the reliability of Infineon Technologies’ radiation‑hardened semiconductor portfolio. Infineon’s IR HiRel rad‑hard devices powered critical Orion systems, including power supply, control...
Indonesia’s Space Ambitions: To Sign the Artemis Accords or to Wait?
The United States is urging Indonesia to join the Artemis Accords, the lunar‑exploration framework signed by 64 nations as of May 2026. Indonesia already enjoys a long‑standing space partnership with the U.S., dating back to the 1976 Palapa‑1 satellite and a...
What Supplies Does the International Space Station Require, Why, When, and How
The International Space Station’s supply chain balances daily crew needs, scientific payloads, and hardware maintenance through a coordinated mix of cargo vehicles. NASA treats supplies as an operating system, planning food, water, air, spare parts, and research cargo to match...
Lunar Outpost Raises $30 Million
Colorado‑based Lunar Outpost announced a $30 million oversubscribed Series B round, led by Industrious Ventures, to revamp its rover lineup for NASA’s Artemis program. The company is developing a new Pegasus rover, leveraging 72 % of its Eagle design, to meet NASA’s revised...
NSF Green Bank Observatory Shares Images, Data From Artemis II Mission
The National Science Foundation’s Green Bank Observatory has released high‑resolution radio images and S‑band telemetry data captured during NASA’s Artemis II crewed lunar‑flyby mission. Using its 100‑meter Robert C. Byrd telescope, the observatory tracked the spacecraft in real time and now...
Space Is Becoming Climate Infrastructure, And China Knows It
China is transforming space into a sovereign, multi‑layered infrastructure, rapidly expanding launch capacity, navigation, communications and Earth‑observation constellations. In 2025 it reported 92 launches, a 35% rise, and plans continued crewed missions, reusable rockets and satellite internet. The United States...
Mint Explainer: Why India’s Space Data Centre Dreams Could Be Far-Fetched
India’s nascent space‑data‑centre sector is attracting buzz, with four home‑grown startups joining global giants like Elon Musk’s X, Starcloud and Relativity in touting satellite‑based AI compute. The Mint explainer argues that while the theory of orbiting GPUs is alluring, the...
The Case for Data Centers in Space
Starcloud is developing orbital data centers to meet surging AI compute demand, beginning with a 1‑kW satellite that ran inference in space and progressing to a 10‑kW rack‑scale unit slated for launch within a year. The company’s roadmap targets a...
Joel Thayer and Matthew Wong: Space Policy Can’t Run on Dial-Up Speeds
The United States now hosts 15,296 active satellites, generating $65.2 billion in 2024, but the FCC’s Space Bureau backlog has swelled to 1,475 applications, slowing projects. A bipartisan push, including FCC rulemaking and the Satellite and Telecommunications (SAT) Streamlining Act, seeks...
The Rapid Rise of Cell Towers in Space
Satellite firms are racing to deliver direct‑to‑device (D2D) broadband, with SpaceX planning 15,000 new satellites and spending $17 billion on spectrum, while Amazon bought Globalstar for $11.6 billion to launch its own constellation. Market analysts forecast cumulative D2D revenue of $100 billion by...
Australian Quantum Technology to Support National Defence Strategy
Australia’s QuantX Labs has launched TEMPO, a quantum clock that delivers up to ten times the precision of conventional GNSS timing systems, now operating in orbit. The technology promises more resilient communications, accurate navigation and robust satellite‑ground synchronization, especially when...
Rocket Lab Announces Five-Launch Neutron Deal as It Continues Aiming for Late 2026 Debut
Rocket Lab announced a block sale of five Neutron and three Electron launches to an undisclosed customer, marking its largest contract to date and surpassing the prior $190 million Haste sub‑orbital deal. The company reported a $2.2 billion backlog, with launch services...
Sama Jordan TV Joins Es’hailSat Video Neighborhood at 26° East
Qatar’s Es’hailSat has added Jordanian news channel Sama Jordan TV to its 26° East video neighborhood, broadcasting via the Es’hail‑2 satellite across the Middle East and North Africa. The direct‑to‑home service is uplinked from the Tier 4‑certified Al Ghuwayriyah Teleport in Doha. This...
A Bizarre 'Decapitated' Asteroid Likely Made the Moon's Largest Impact Crater. NASA's Artemis Astronauts May Land Near the Proof
A new study using high‑resolution 3‑D simulations argues that the Moon’s South Pole–Aitken basin was formed by a 260‑km differentiated asteroid that was ‘decapitated’ on impact, leaving its iron core to carve the basin’s tapered shape. The shallow, north‑to‑south impact would...
US Air Force Sets Its Sights On Space Solar Power
The U.S. Air Force has awarded its first contract to startup Overview Energy to demonstrate space‑solar technology that beams power from geosynchronous orbit to Earth. Overview, which raised $20 million from investors, plans to launch satellites in 2028 and deliver megawatt‑scale...
NASA Welcomes Paraguay as 67th Artemis Accords Signatory
On May 7, 2026, Paraguay signed the Artemis Accords in Asunción, becoming the 67th nation to endorse the framework governing peaceful, transparent space exploration. The agreement aligns Paraguay’s emerging space program, which recently launched GuaraníSat‑1 and plans a GuaraníSat‑2 launch...
With Launches Slated to Grow a Hundredfold, Space Force Seeks More Sites, Money, People, and AI
The U.S. Space Force announced a plan to expand its launch cadence from more than 200 rockets this year to as many as 3,000 annually by 2036. Achieving that scale will require additional launch pads, significantly higher funding, a doubled...
James Webb Space Telescope Brings Details Of Nearby 'Super-Earth' Into Focus
The James Webb Space Telescope used its Mid‑Infrared Instrument to obtain the first surface‑level spectroscopy of the nearby super‑Earth LHS 3844 b. The data reveal a dark, olivine‑rich, featureless crust and a complete lack of CO₂ and SO₂, suggesting an old, airless...
Redwire Pursues Opportunities in Landers and Power Systems for NASA’s Moon Base Plans
Redwire is refocusing on lunar landers and power systems after NASA signaled a steady cadence of moon‑base landings. The company, a CLPS contract holder through its Deep Space Systems acquisition, has yet to win a task order but sees a...
EarthDaily Secures $1.2M NRO Contract to Evaluate Multispectral Imagery
Vancouver‑based EarthDaily Analytics has secured a $1.2 million contract from the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office to evaluate its commercial multispectral imagery under the agency’s Strategic Commercial Enhancements program. The award follows the company’s recent appointment to the INSA Space Intelligence Council,...
Misinformation and the Space Economy
Misinformation is emerging as a systemic risk for the $613 billion global space economy, threatening demand, financing, and procurement across launch services, satellite navigation, and Earth‑observation markets. The Space Foundation and OECD note that false claims can ripple into downstream sectors...
Industry Moon Lander Training Cabin Lands at NASA for Artemis
NASA’s Johnson Space Center now houses a full‑scale mock‑up of Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 2 crew cabin, a 15‑foot‑tall training module for the Artemis lunar program. The trainer will support human‑in‑the‑loop simulations, suit checkouts and docking rehearsals as NASA prepares...
Juno Flies Past the Jupiter Moon Thebe
On May 1, 2026 NASA’s Juno spacecraft executed a close flyby of Jupiter’s inner moon Thebe, skimming within roughly 3,100 miles (5,000 km). The encounter yielded the clearest image of Thebe to date, captured by Juno’s Stellar Reference Unit camera, though the navigation‑focused...
Anduril Secures $100M Modification to Modernize Space Surveillance Network
Anduril Industries has secured a $100.3 million contract modification from the U.S. Space Force to expand and modernize the Space Surveillance Network (SSN). The award funds the rollout of SDANet, a mesh‑based communications architecture built on Anduril’s Lattice software, replacing fragmented...
Air Force Plans to Ditch BACN Jets for Satellite Communications
The U.S. Air Force will retire its seven E-11A Battlefield Airborne Communications Node (BACN) aircraft by fiscal year 2028, shifting the mission to satellite‑based communications. The transition will be driven by the Hybrid SATCOM Terminal program, which aims to field...
MDA Space Reports 32% Revenue Growth in Q1 2026 as Backlog Conversion Accelerates
Canadian aerospace firm MDA Space posted Q1 2026 consolidated revenue of $464.1 million CAD (≈$343 million USD), a 32.2% year‑over‑year increase, driven primarily by a 41% jump in its Satellite Systems segment. The company’s backlog shrank to $3.7 billion CAD (≈$2.7 billion USD) as...
AST SpaceMobile Pivots to SpaceX for Mid-June Launch of Three BlueBird Satellites
AST SpaceMobile announced that its next three BlueBird Block 2 satellites will launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 in mid‑June 2026, after the April New Glenn failure left BlueBird 7 unrecoverable. The shift to SpaceX restores deployment momentum for the company’s low‑Earth‑orbit cellular broadband constellation....
A Grapefruit-Sized Quantum Device Mapped Earth’s Magnetic Field From Space
Researchers aboard the International Space Station deployed OSCAR‑QUBE, a 10‑centimeter quantum magnetometer built around a diamond with nitrogen‑vacancy defects, to map Earth’s magnetic field over a ten‑month period in 2021‑2022. The device’s readings aligned closely with established magnetic field models,...
Real Wireless Tapped by UK Spectrum Policy Forum for Lunar Connectivity Study
On May 7, 2026 the UK Spectrum Policy Forum commissioned Real Wireless to produce a three‑month study on the regulatory frameworks needed for lunar communications. The consultancy will chart spectrum demand, identify suitable frequency bands and propose rules that enable Earth‑ground, orbital...
Multiple Russian, Chinese, and American Satellites in Maneuvering Dance in Orbit
Recent reports document a series of proximity operations involving military satellites from Russia, China and the United States. Russia’s Cosmos‑2581, 2582 and 2583 flew within roughly 3 m of each other in low‑Earth orbit, while the U.S. inspector satellite USA‑325 and...
PROFEN and Azercosmos Expand Satellite Services Across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa
PROFEN, a Turkish satellite communications provider, and Azerbaijan’s Azercosmos have signed a cooperation agreement at SAHA Expo 2026 to use capacity on the Azerspace‑1 and Azerspace‑2 GEO satellites across Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The deal leverages PROFEN’s ground...