As the landscape of space operations becomes increasingly contested \u2013 and as government investment in space-related activities shrinks \u2013 a failure to partner with industry could be a threat to national security, according to industry experts and defense officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To combat evolving space-based threats, the government is looking at new ways to take advantage of the commercial space industry’s investments and technological advances. Also on the table are options for sharing infrastructure between agencies rather than building stovepipes and one-off solutions, officials said March 17 at the Satellite 2015 conference in Washington.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“With the sophistication and robustness of threats we potentially face in the future, it’s not enough,” said Col. Chris Crawford, director of space policy implementation in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy. “We have to leap ahead in terms of our ability to shore up critical space capabilities and in the types of capabilities [we use] in space.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some of the much-needed advancements in government space capabilities hinge on gains made in the private sector, including more efficient use of hosted payloads and the development and use of small satellites, panel members noted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tina Harrington, director of the National Reconnaissance Office’s SIGINT directorate, pointed out that one thing the government needs from industry is end-to-end hosted payload solutions, “not just the piece-parts\u2026it needs to be the total package.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Beyond partnering with industry, Harrington also said the NRO is working to collaborate with other agencies on infrastructure-type development that can be shared for similar programs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“What we have done within NRO is go after the architecture approach \u2013 what do I need from an architectural standpoint so I do not keep building all of these stovepipes? And then as I build my architecture approach, I tap into other folks’ infrastructure and use that so I don’t have to rebuild it,” Harrington said. “There are a lot of things we have to keep in-house, but there are a lot of things we’re trying to reach out and not rebuild. And even anything we’re building in-house, we’re looking at it as the architecture and I don’t build it just for one. At today’s price point we can’t build everything as one-offs.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The partnerships are critical to maintaining the United States’ technological edge in space, panel members noted, particularly as it relates to defense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We can pull together more disparate pieces of information, we can operate in a joint way, more effectively, with more initiative than anybody else in the world,” Crawford said. “There’s going to be back-and-forth over time with [who leads in] technology, and space is transitioning from a period where we lept ahead from the rest of the world\u2026but we as a community can still leverage the advantages we have in other domains.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Other panel members warned that a failure to partner could mean major risks to national security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We will lose our advantage in space and put our national security at risk if the U.S. government doesn’t partner with commercial industry to leverage their investments in space,” said Kay Sears, president of Intelsat General.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If the government fails to partner with industry in space, it could threaten national security.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":55955,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":16,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[8,16,39],"tags":[],"coauthors":[2772],"class_list":["post-18977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-c2-comms","category-it-networks","category-satellites"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"APKGV6AKAJETHBWUM3D5JNDWEU","arc_canonical_url":"\/it-networks\/2015\/03\/18\/satellite-2015-going-it-alone-not-an-option-for-space-security\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n