Max Q - Blue Origin's lunar lander lawsuit is no more

Hello and welcome back to Max Q! We’re quickly approaching TC Sessions: Space, our dedicated space event. You can find more details on how to join at the bottom of this newsletter — plus a sneak peek of the agenda. Trust me when I say, you won’t want to miss it.

NASA: 1, Blue Origin: 0

Could it be? Have we reached the end of the Human Landing System program saga? It appears so; a federal judge on Thursday threw out Blue Origin’s suit against NASA over its decision to award SpaceX the sole contract for the program.

The dismissal of the complaint brings to a close a months-long saga over the Human Landing System program, a NASA initiative to facilitate the design of a lunar landing system that could return humans to the moon in 2024, and gives SpaceX and NASA the green light to proceed on the HLS program.

Federal judge Richard Hertling’s dismissal of the suit is currently sealed, so the exact reasoning behind the decision isn’t yet clear, but he ordered the parties to prepare proposed redactions near the end of the month so the document could be released to the public.

How did Elon Musk take the news? Well…

Jeff Bezos, meanwhile, signaled in his own tweet that the likelihood of Blue filing an appeal is vanishingly small.

Project Kuiper looks to send its first prototypes to orbit with ABL Space Systems by the end of next year

Speaking of Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos… SpaceX’s Starlink is the best-known and most advanced satellite internet initiative, but did you know that Amazon’s been working on sending up its own broadband constellation? It’s looking like the project is finally getting off the ground, with the subsidiary that runs the initiative, Project Kuiper, announcing that it would launch two prototype satellites by the end of next year.

The license to launch must first be approved by the Federal Communications Commission, but assuming it is, the two prototypes — dubbed KuiperSat-1 and KuiperSat-2 — would launch from Cape Canaveral in two separate missions by the fourth quarter of 2022.

The other big news out of that announcement is that Kuiper selected startup ABL Space Systems as its launch provider for the two missions. While ABL’s 88-foot-tall RS1 rocket has yet to reach orbit, the startup said it plans to conduct the first test launch from Alaska by the end of this year.

It’s been a big few weeks for ABL: Last week, it closed a $200 million financing round, which reportedly boosted its valuation up to $2.4 billion

It's an LEO broadband constellation bonanza, with Astra joining in

I couldn’t help but notice a HUGE influx of applications on Thursday for low Earth orbit broadband constellations à la Starlink and Project Kuiper. I was scratching my head until I remembered that it was nearing the deadline for the FCC’s second V-band processing round, so all the companies were in a hurry to get their proposals in.

A quick round-up:

• Astra, which requested to build an LEO broadband constellation consisting of 13,620 (!) satellites, which the company aims to manufacture in-house.
• Hughes Network Systems applied for a 1,440-satellite broadband constellation.
• Inmarsat, a British company, is looking to serve U.S. customers with a 198-satellite constellation.
• Telesat, a Canadian company, filed for a constellation of 1,373.

The Googler who came to monetize space

TC contributor Martine Paris spoke to Axiom Space’s chief revenue officer Tejpaul Bhatia about the company’s vision for its commercial space station and the future of work, research, retreats and science in low Earth orbit.

“As chief revenue officer my mandate is to create a hyper growth business platform that will serve as a launchpad for businesses, industries and markets to scale exponentially over the next seven to 10 years,” he said. “That’s a very different model than how the space industry has operated to date as a government taxpayer endeavor. The private sector is far better suited for the task.”

“I’m a little over 100 days on the job and see it’s not theoretical — metal is being bent, people are going up, contracts are being signed,” he said. “Our first module is already under construction at our Thales Alenia plant in Italy. This is not science fiction. It’s really happening.”

More news from TC and beyond

Boeing is also looking to join the internet satellite market. The Federal Communications Commission authorized the company’s broadband satellite constellation application, granting Boeing six years to launch half of its planned 147-satellite constellation and nine years to complete deployments to orbit.

Turion Space and iRocket have signed a multi-launch deal to send Turion’s forthcoming Droid satellites to orbit. Turion wants to use the satellites to clean up space debris and to assist with in-orbit servicing.

Redwire is adding to its long list of acquisitions with the purchase of Techshot, a company that specializes in biotech for microgravity environments. Techshot currently has a “bioprinter” on the International Space Station that can print human tissue.

The U.S. Space Force has launched “Orbital Prime,” a new initiative that will provide funding to businesses working on on-orbit servicing, assembly and manufacturing. Companies must partner with a nonprofit or academic institution to be eligible. The first round of contracts could be awarded as soon as early 2022.

Virgin Orbit signed an MOU with Japan’s Ana Holdings to provide 20 flights of the LauncherOne rocket, with the goal of making Japan’s Oita Prefecture ready for orbital launches by the end of 2022.

The early agenda for TC Sessions: Space is here

Last year we held our first dedicated space event, and it went so well that we decided to host it again in 2021. This year, it’s happening December 14 and 15, and it’s once again going to be an entirely virtual conference, so people from all over the world will be able to join — and you can, too.

Check out a sneak peek of the early agenda by clicking here. Suffice to say, you won’t want to miss it.

• Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at Earthjustice (San Francisco, Suite 500)
• Manager Technology at Common Impact (Brooklyn, NY, USA)
• Senior Full Stack Engineer at Pharmacy Data Management, Inc. (Poland, Ohio, USA)
• Systems Support Analyst at Oltmans Construction (Whittier, California, USA)
• Security Engineer at Motionpoint Corp (Coconut Creek, FL, USA)

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