Space station module developer Gravitics has won a $1.7 million contract from the US Space Force to develop orbital platforms to enable responsive space missions.
The contract is part of a broader Force initiative to acquire space capabilities – such as launch, satellite payload integration and even satellite operation – from private industry within a timely manner. previously unpublished. The initiative is called TacRS, or TacRS, and has already resulted in record-breaking missions: Firefly Space’s Alpha rocket left the pad just 27 hours after receiving its launch notice from the Space Force in the part of its TacRS contract last year.
Although Gravitics was unable to provide further details on the exact concept of operations, the startup’s co-founder and chief marketing officer, Mike DeRosa, clarified in an email that the company is not installing a module on a rocket for a tactically responsive launch. Instead, the mission is to develop “platforms to enable a new type of tactically responsive space mission,” he said.
The $1.7 million contract was awarded by SpaceWERX in partnership with Space Systems Command’s Space Safari Program Office. In a statement, Space Safari’s director of operations, Lt. Col. Jason Altenhofen, said the Gravitics module “offers an unconventional and potentially game-changing solution for TacRS.”
“As we look to the future, the innovative use of business technologies will be an important aspect of solving some of our toughest challenges,” he said.
Gravitics will work with several other companies as part of the contract, including Rocket Lab, True Anomaly, Space Exploration Engineering and Eta Space. While there are few concrete details on how the companies will work together, the company said the partners “will help refine the mission architecture, develop use case-specific equipment, and develop flight equipment”.
Rocket Lab and True Anomaly have been awarded separate reactive space contracts for a mission called Victus Haze earlier this month. Under this contract, each company will build spacecraft that will then be quickly fielded and prepared for on-orbit rendezvous operations.
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