• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to secondary sidebar
  • NEWS:
  • SatNews
  • SatMagazine
  • MilSatMagazine
  • SmallSat News
  • |     EVENTS:
  • SmallSat Symposium
  • Satellite Innovation
  • MilSat Symposium

SatNews

  • HOME
  • Magazines
  • Events
  • Perspectives
  • Industry Calendar
    • IN PERSON
    • VIRTUAL
  • Subscribe

Loft Orbital Contracted By AFWERX and USSF / SMC For NextGen Onboard Processor

May 5, 2021

Loft Orbital has been awarded a Phase II Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract by AFWERX and sponsored by the U.S. Space Force (USSF) Space and Missile Systems Center’s (SMC) Portfolio Architect office.

The contract will provide funding to support Loft Orbital’s development of a high-performance, reprogrammable onboard edge computing environment and associated applications. This will address a major government and commercial operator need for large constellations of satellites to execute autonomous decision-making and mission tasks.

Under this contract, Loft Orbital will develop its next-generation onboard processor to support customer and third party “massless payloads” onboard. This onboard processor will function as a “brain” on Loft Orbital spacecraft, providing an environment to host applications for sensor data processing, mission autonomy, satellite self-protection, or any other application requiring advanced computing at the edge.

Other potential applications of the edge processor include payload and telemetry data processing, as well as the ingestion of other space assets’ data through intersatellite links. This space edge processor allows individual satellites to act as computing nodes within a mesh-connected network of other satellites, ground stations, and cloud datacenters, yet capable of advanced processing in isolation in denied or congested communications
environments.

In addition, Loft will develop a machine learning software package to autonomously detect, identify and mitigate cyber threats onboard the spacecraft, an important capability for government missions.

YAM-2 and -3 satellites on-orbit.

Loft Orbital was previously awarded an AFWERX SBIR Phase I contract. In combination with private
capital investment, this SBIR Phase II award will allow Loft Orbital to enhance this processor based on USSF feedback from Phase I. Loft Orbital is targeting a future mission as the first flight of this
second-generation processor, with the goal of making it as a standard offering for US Government
satellite programs.

“There is an unprecedented convergence occurring between commercial and government space infrastructure. Capabilities, threats, and vulnerabilities are now increasingly shared between these communities,” said Andrew Berg, Loft Orbital’s VP of Business Development. “We’re pleased that SMC is placing its confidence in Loft Orbital to advance its innovative onboard processing architecture. This commercially-derived enhanced capability will offer a leap ahead in the pursuit of seamless Joint All- Domain Command and Control in support of national security space objectives, and we are excited to be selected as a partner to SMC in defining that way ahead.”

Filed Under: Agencies, Contracts, Development, SMC, U.S. Space Force

Primary Sidebar

Most Read Stories

  • CORRECTION: Blue Origin launches their 5th human spaceflight mission
  • neXat empowers affordable satellite internet for Indonesian businesses 
  • Satellogic is a finalist for “Company Award 2022” by the European Association of Remote Sensing Companies
  • SES and Vodafone PNG to deliver 4G and 5G services to underserved areas in Papua New Guinea
  • neXat interconnects with Eutelsat ADVANCE network resulting in wider coverage and better flexibility for ISPs

About Satnews

  • Contacts
  • History

Archives

  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020

Secondary Sidebar

x
Sign up Now (For Free)
Access daily or weekly satellite news updates covering all aspects of the commercial and military satellite industry.
Invalid email address
Notify Me Regarding ( At least one ):
We value your privacy and will not sell or share your email or other information with any other company. You may also unsubscribe at anytime.

Click Here to see our full privacy policy.
Thanks for subscribing!