The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) has awarded new two-year contracts to three synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite imagery providers: Capella Space, ICEYE US, and Umbra, as reported by an NRO spokesperson to Breaking Defense on Wednesday.
The spokesperson explained that the contracts were extended by the NRO’s Commercial Systems Program Office under the Strategic Commercial Enhancements Broad Agency Announcement (SCE BAA), initially granted on January 20, 2022. The extension for the SCE BAA Stage III – Commercial Radar Capabilities will run from July 2024 to July 2026.
Originally, five SAR satellite companies were part of the study contracts, including the three recent awardees, along with the US division of European aerospace giant Airbus and Florida-based start-up PredaSAR.
In October, Airbus announced plans to cut approximately 2,500 jobs, primarily affecting its Space Systems segment. Reuters reported that the company has officially declared 2,043 job reductions, with over half stemming from the Space Systems division.
PredaSAR’s parent company, Terran Orbital, halted plans for its SAR satellite constellation in October 2022, leading the NRO to remove PredaSAR from its list of contractors when the contract expired in September 2023. Terran Orbital, which faced significant debt challenges, was acquired by Lockheed Martin on October 30.
Industry experts anticipate that the new Stage III contracts will represent the final short-term, relatively small-scale awards under the SCE BAA, as senior NRO officials push for the establishment of a long-term program in the fiscal 2026 budget. Although the NRO’s budget remains classified, it is widely known that the agency has approximately $10 million per year allocated for about 15 study contracts with providers of SAR, radio frequency geolocation, and hyperspectral satellite imagery.
“In our view, this demonstrates the Commercial Systems Program Office’s commitment to supporting SAR technology and indicates their seriousness,” stated Joe Morrison, Vice President and General Manager for Remote Sensing at Umbra, during an interview with Breaking Defense on Tuesday.
“While they have not yet established a formal program, they are actively working to transition from the study phase while developing additional significant and substantive phases for the industry,” he added.
