The failure of a 1.5 million-pound Russian Proton booster carrying a 4.5-ton Japanese communications satellite has International Launch Services (ILS) concerned about holding onto its $1 billion customer backlog, while JSAT Corp. in Tokyo is assessing the impact of the $275 million accident on its long-term satcom business plan.
The U.S. Marine Corps' component of U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) still needs some tweaking to make sure Marine special operators can work together smoothly with those of other services, a recent U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report says. GAO recommends that the Marine Corps conduct an analysis of the critical skills and competencies required of personnel in its special operations command and that USSOCOM establish a basis to ensure they are trained to be fully interoperable with DOD's special operations forces.
C-/KU-BAND SAT RFP: Asia Broadcast Satellite of Hong Kong plans to issue a request for proposals for a new C-/Ku-band satellite next month. A purchase decision is expected at year's end, followed by launch around 2010. The company says it is interested in 40 of the 66 planned transponders so far, but the actual size of the buy will depend on the market.
Congressional mandates to rein in seemingly improper contracting by the Defense Department over commercial items and services are making their way into federal regulations. DOD has adopted the final version of a new regulation that codified Section 803 of the fiscal 2006 defense authorization act, which limits acquisition of a major weapon system as a commercial item, according to a Sept. 6 notice in the Federal Register.
Manned and unmanned aircraft will be needed to protect maritime interests from terrorist attacks as the government gears up its new joint maritime domain awareness (MDA) office, the agency's head said Sept. 5. "No threat comes through a single domain, so air, land, sea all have to be linked, otherwise we create another set of stovepipes," said Navy Rear Adm. Lee Metcalf, the first director of the Joint, Inter Agency National Office of Global Maritime Situational Awareness (GMSA).
ORBITAL POSITIONS: Telesat Canada and SES's new Canadian affiliate, Ciel, both indicate they plan to fill all of the new orbital positions allocated by Canada this summer. Telesat received five slots, including one for Ka-band, and Ciel was given seven. Several of Ciel's slots are likely to be brought into service through outsourcing deals with other operators like EchoStar. Details of the two projects have yet to be worked out, but the Canadian authorities want the slots in use by 2010.
ACQUISITION: Private equity firm Apex Partners has closed a deal to acquire Telenor Satellite Services. The company will be combined with France Telecom's former mobile satellite communications unit and folded into a new satellite service provider, Vizada. Telenor's satellite broadcasting unit is not part of the transaction.
The Iraq debate will dominate Capitol Hill this month, think tank analysts told a Washington audience as lawmakers reconvened ahead of a busy hearing schedule. But finding a consensus beyond eventual troop withdrawal will be the new challenge. "Iraq is truly the 8 million-pound gorilla in the room," said Norman Ornstein, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.
The Phoenix Mars lander's radar and UHF radio - both critical systems for a successful landing on May 25, 2008 - have completed in-flight checks as the spacecraft heads to Mars at 76,000 mph. Phoenix has covered more than 50 million miles of its 422 million-mile flight to Mars since its Aug. 4 launch from Cape Canaveral on a Delta II booster.
A pending U.S.-U.K. export controls treaty - whose details could be released in coming days - will reflect several regulatory recommendations made earlier this year by industry and is on its way to being extended toward Australia as well, international officials said Sept. 5. Andrew Radcliffe, counselor for defense equipment in the British Embassy in Washington, said the treaty should be sent to Congress, Parliament or both by next week, clearing the way for officials to discuss the signed-but-unfinished deal publicly.
Raytheon Missile Systems hopes NASA will be attracted to the skills it has honed building the U.S. Navy's Standard Missile 3 (SM-3) and the missile-defense Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle (EKV) when it picks an instrument-unit contractor for the Ares I crew launch vehicle later this year.
There has never been a better chance than now to reform the U.S. export regime, U.S. and foreign officials and experts said Sept. 5. But any change is racing the 2008 elections clock and already faces European and industrial fatigue.
A Sept. 5 story on the Airborne Laser misidentified a congressional committee. Boeing plans to lobby the Senate Appropriations Committee for full funding for ABL. The Senate Armed Services Committee marked up its version of the corresponding ABL language in May.
The U.S. Army has developed a "500-Day Plan" to guide the service in the acquisition and operation of its information technology (IT) needs. "This Army CIO/G-6 500-Day Plan focuses on the near-term specified and implied missions in the Army Campaign Plan, as well as OSD and Joint strategic guidance," wrote Vernon M. Bettencourt, Jr., Army acting chief information officer, in the plan's opening statement.
In the coming year the U.S. Navy plans to purchase new hardware and commercial satellite services to increase the communications bandwidth available to ships by 50-70 percent, according to Dave Weddel, assistant deputy chief of naval operations for communications networks. The Navy is eager to replace the services provided by the Inmarsat constellation, which still provides most of the bandwidth for small Navy ships, Weddel said during an Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association luncheon in Arlington, Va., Sept. 5.
The National Academies' National Research Council (NRC) is recommending that one mission among the current slate of NASA "Beyond Einstein" astrophysics missions - the Joint Dark Energy Mission (JDEM) - be fast-tracked for a 2009 start. A joint effort between NASA and the Department of Energy (DOE), JDEM would use an optical-to-near-infrared wide field survey telescope to investigate the distribution of dark energy.
SOUTHCOM UAVS: The U.S. Navy has awarded a Phase III Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) contract to Optics 1 to help Southern Command in antiterrorist operations. The company will provide maintenance, engineering and technology improvements on existing - but unidentified - unmanned aerial systems, unattended ground systems, unattended surveillance systems and intelligence collection systems.
ARMY Alpine Armoring Inc. was awarded on Aug. 27, 2007, a $7,510,400 firm-fixed-price contract for commercial in-stock heavy armor vehicles. The work will be performed in Herndon, Va., and is expected to be completed by Nov. 1, 2007. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. There were five bids solicited on Aug. 16, 2007, and five bids were received. The Tacom, Warren, Mich., is the contracting activity (W56HZV-07-C-0648).
TURKISH VLS: U.S. Naval Sea Systems Command is awarding Lockheed Martin's Naval Electronics & Surveillance Systems a $6.37 million contract modification for two MK 41 Vertical Launching System shipsets for Turkey under the Foreign Military Sales Program, the Pentagon announced Aug. 30. The deal includes spares, special tools, test equipment, material and services to refurbish fixtures and transport equipment. Most of the work will be performed in Baltimore, Md. (70 percent), while the rest will take place in Minneapolis, Minn. It is expected to finish by March 2010.
Boeing's Family of Advanced Beyond-line-of-sight Terminals (FAB-T) successfully acquired an operational Milstar satellite and completed downlink data transmissions, the company announced.
