The U.S. Air Force began using Global Positioning System — higher often called GPS — satellites nearly 50 years ago, which have turn into critical infrastructure for each the military and the economy.
Since then, GPS is estimated to have generated greater than $1.4 trillion in economic advantages, in response to a Commerce Department study. However, the agency warned that an “outage could potentially have an economic impact of $1 billion per day.”
Pentagon leaders consider those losses are a conservative estimate, which prompted the U.S. Space Force to launch a roughly $2 billion satellite program called the Resilient Global Positioning System. The program, called R-GPS for brief, is meant to supply an alternate backup network for the present satellite system.
“[GPS is] “It is critically important to everything we do every day, from the stock market to the timing of every transaction to the crops we grow,” said Lt. Col. Justin Deifel, head of R-GPS at the Space Force’s Space Systems Command . said CNBC.
“It’s like water and electricity. … It is a benefit of the economy and a benefit of a warplane that we must ensure its availability,” Deifel added.
The importance of the existing 31 GPS satellites in orbit, as well as the potential threat in space from U.S. adversaries such as Russia and China, have led the Pentagon to prioritize building the alternative R-GPS network – and the Space Force has committed to the commercial one Use turned to space industry to do this.
Last month, the industry awarded contracts for R-GPS design concepts to four companies: Astranis, Axient, L3 Harris and Sierra Space.
Astranis branches
For startup Astranis, which launched its first “MicroGEO” spacecraft last year, the R-GPS program marks an expansion beyond satellite internet into the positioning, navigation and timing, or PNT, services market.
“We have begun to see a huge push from the U.S. national security community toward higher orbit proliferation,” Astranis CEO John Gedmark told CNBC. “Now the Department of Defense has realized all the fantastic things we can do with a next-generation small satellite approach in high orbit.”
As it expands as a company, Astranis announces its new Nexus line of PNT satellites, its answer to the R-GPS program. Gedmark noted that they use the same type of spacecraft as the company's broadband satellites.
Additionally, since R-GPS satellites will operate in medium Earth orbit like the current GPS constellation, the Nexus product line represents an expansion of the areas in which Astranis intends to deploy and operate its spacecraft.
The company, which has raised $750 million since it was founded in 2015, has announced contracts for 12 of its internet satellites, 10 of which are expected to launch into geosynchronous orbit by the end of next year.
“We knew pretty early on that this platform we were developing could be used for missions other than broadband telecommunications, and the Resilient GPS program is a perfect example of that right now,” Gedmark said.
Gedmark sees R-GPS as a “billion-dollar opportunity” as Space Force aims to build a full constellation of at least two dozen satellites.
The R-GPS plan
Space Force used a novel Pentagon funding agency called Quick Start to get the R-GPS program off the ground.
In less than six months, the program received approval from the deputy secretary of defense, conducted market research, hosted a business industry day, solicited bids and awarded initial contracts – a process that often takes up to three years for space programs, according to the military.
“The speed at which they have advanced this program is unprecedented. … We’ve never seen the Department of Defense move so quickly before,” Gedmark said.
R-GPS provided a complete of $40 million to fund the design studies. Companies have an eight-month “phase zero” period to start work, which ends within the spring, SSC’s Deifel explained.
“The current total budget, if you just think about the recurring engineering costs: We’re looking at $50.” [million] to $80 million per satellite and the procurement of greater than 24 satellites. So the short math is $1.2 [billion] “We're looking at $1.9 billion for 24 satellites over the next five to six years,” Deifel said.
While the budget doesn’t currently include “one-off engineering costs,” Deifel expects these expenses to be well below design costs.
Space Systems Command desires to purchase and deploy the R-GPS satellites in groups of eight, with the primary set scheduled to launch as early as 2028.
As design reviews are accomplished, SSC plans to pick a number of of the businesses to advance this system into the development phase.
While Astranis' first satellite malfunctioned last yr resulting from a third-party problem with its solar arrays, Gedmark is confident about its probabilities within the R-GPS program due to company's experience operating in distant geosynchronous orbit.
“We are the only company that has proven a spacecraft of this class in orbit – a low-cost, [radiation]“Hardened high orbit satellite,” Gedmark said.
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