Weekly Recap #35 + Juno Propulsion Interview

Main Topics Dr. Alexis Harroun, CEO of Juno Propulsion, joins Space Times this week to explain how their Rotating Detonation Combustion thruster will change the game for in-space mobility! Headliners * Starship v3 launched on May 22nd with mixed success, the booster lost 3 engines and landed but not as expected, while Starship lost an RVAC engine but still accomplished its landing in the Indian Ocean. 22 mass dummies were deployed in space, including 2 Dodger Dogs that had Starlink hardware for testing and imaging of Starship. [source] * York acquired Solestial for their silicon based solar array technology, their third acquisition for core component production since York’s IPO. [source] * Vast announced their expansion from commercial space stations into high power buses, providing a 15kW spacecraft. They have an anchor customer who has so far purchased 4 satellites, with an option for 200 more. [source] Defense * The United States Space Force awarded $437M to Viasat and SES for 2 satellites each for Protected Tactical Satcom Global. [source] * The United States Space Force awarded $398M to Northrop Grumman for a Protected Tactical Satcom Prototype that can resist GPS jamming. [source] * The United States Space Force awarded $90M to Rocket Lab for Heimdall, a space domain awareness program that was being worked on by Geost prior to its acquisition last year. [source] * Helsing, OHB, Hensoldt, and Kongsberg formed the KIRK joint venture to develop space-based AI-enabled space domain awareness for detection and tracking of in-orbit threats. [source] * The UK Space Agency inaugurated their new space domain awareness software Borealis 6 months ahead of schedule, demonstrating it with their existing on-orbit asset Noctis-1 for space-based detection. [source] * Iceye delivered 4 SAR satellites to the Polish Ministry of Defense within 12 months. [source] Commercialization * Iceye launched their new catastrophe monitoring solution focused on the banking sector to provide more accurate insurance and pricing of property and assets. [source] * Amadeus IT selected Spire’s aircraft tracking data for airport tools to improve management and planning. [source] * Sky Perfect JSAT invested in Astroscale to partner on on-orbit servicing. [source] Business Moves * SpaceX filed their S-1 with the SEC in preparation for their upcoming IPO. The filing revealed over 200 pages of details about SpaceX’s business including their $1.75B price target, their $18.67B in revenue last year, $4.94B of operational losses, and a massive $28.5T TAM. [source] * Blue Origin is rumored to be considering accepting outside money for the first time, this comes from internal all-hands meeting and could mean they will be seeking private investors or an IPO. [source] * Tomorrow.io extended their Series F by $35M, bringing their total raised to $210M focused on delivering on their DeepSky AI-enabled weather satellite constellation. [source] * Zenk Space raised $26M in preparation of its debut launch of the medium lift Zhihang-1 rocket in June. [source] * Mach Industries acquired Exquadrum for $50M winning out over a rumored 8 other competitors, this allows Mach to produce their own solid rocket motors internally, securing a critical and constrained component for missile production. [source] Tech Advances * The Canadian DND and ISED launched $5.5M in challenges for Arctic optical communications and quantum repeaters. [source] * The US Space Force and SpaceWERX launched their orbital logistics challenge for orbital fuel depots, transfer vehicles, ISAM technologies, and more. [source] Get full access to Space Times at spacetimespod.substack.com/subscribe