The global space economy showed strong momentum in 2019 but faces a significant challenge going forward due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Space Foundation cautions in the first quarterly installment of its annual economic assessment.
Japan has set up a project office for its Next Generation Fighter program and reiterated an intention to decide on an international partner within eight months, despite a report last month that the U.S. was already preferred.
Air navigation service providers (ANSPs), particularly those that are privately owned, are taking tough steps to ensure they can survive the slump in air traffic caused by the coronavirus crisis.
Astronics, the already embattled provider of aircraft seat technology and other interior products, is “adjusting its workforce” to align with a dropoff in demand due to the coronavirus and sudden economic slowdown.
The commander of the USS Theodore Roosevelt has asked the head of U.S. Pacific Fleet to remove his 4,000-member crew from the aircraft carrier and send the sailors into quarantine on Guam as the novel coronavirus continues to spread on the ship.
The Space Force’s Space and Missile Systems Center has awarded two contracts worth up to $500 million each to Raytheon and L3Harris Technologies to develop and produce new, secure modems.
Over the next three to six months, the Department of the Air Force is transferring 23 missions from the U.S. Air Force to the Space Force, expanding the nascent service’s responsibilities.
Veteran astronauts Shannon Walker of NASA and Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency have been added to the crew of the first operational mission under SpaceX’s Commercial Crew flight services contract.
Virgin Orbit has developed a new, mass-producible bridge ventilator that is pending clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to fight the novel coronavirus.
NASA has selected the Sun Radio Interferometer Space Experiment, a multiple small satellite mission to study how the Sun generates giant solar particle storms while mapping the host star’s magnetic field lines as they extend outward into the Solar System.
China appears to have developed at least one and perhaps three direct-ascent anti-satellite programs, one of which appears to have been declared operational, according to a pair of reports issued March 30 on global space threats.
Aerospace and defense manufacturers and suppliers looking to tap the U.S. government’s new coronavirus-related treasure trove of loans and guarantees will first have to show they could not find financing elsewhere, and they must not lay off more than 10% of their workforce through September.
Lockheed Martin says it is taking the final steps to ensure that the jam-resistant Military Code (M-Code) signal for GPS satellites is declared operational this year.
April will serve as a milestone month for the nascent U.S. Space Force. Not only will the new acquisition council meet for the first time, the service will also submit recommendations to the chief on unified missile warning architecture.
The U.S. State Department has green lighted a potential $194 million sale that would allow South Korea to upgrade its F-16 Block 32 aircraft with identification friend-or-foe (IFF) and other advanced systems.
Saab is developing a containerized battle-damage repair system for its Gripen combat aircraft that will use additive manufacturing to get aircraft back in the air.
United Technologies and Raytheon said March 30 they received the necessary antitrust and other regulatory approvals to complete their merger, and that their newly combined company should be born April 3.
