The US Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center (SMC) has awarded a contract to Space Systems/Loral (SS/L) for the design and development of concepts for next generation of Protected Military Satellite Communications (MILSATCOM) systems.

The undisclosed award follows a $1.5m six-month study contract secured by the company in March 2011, for the evaluation of commercial technologies and practices for cost-effectively addressing the military communication requirements.

Go deeper with GlobalData

Go deeper with GlobalData

The gold standard of business intelligence.

Find out more

Discover B2B Marketing That Performs

Combine business intelligence and editorial excellence to reach engaged professionals across 36 leading media platforms.

Find out more

SS/L president John Celli said the contract provides the company with an opportunity to continue its efforts to offer cost-effective solutions based on commercial market innovation to the US government.

"Working with our industry partners, we will use domain expertise, proven military technology, and our supply chain efficiencies to quickly bring increased capability to the warfighter," Celli added.

Under the new contract, the company will design affordable solutions having shorter schedules and lower, better controlled cost to help increase the system’s defence against increasing and changing intentional jamming and cyber threats and also to provide advanced communications capability to the deployed soldiers.

The company will also help the command eliminate the existing gaps in the space communications layer, in addition to demonstrating specific design concepts that are designed to improve life-cycle affordability to address the warfighter’s communication need in the future.

GlobalData Strategic Intelligence

US Tariffs are shifting - will you react or anticipate?

Don’t let policy changes catch you off guard. Stay proactive with real-time data and expert analysis.

By GlobalData

The company is planning to combine its extensive expertise in commercial satellites development together with existing military technologies to evaluate options for both space and ground segment design of the MILSATCOM systems.

The Protected MILSATCOM programme aims at development of practical new architectures and technologies to help increase protection of the US Military’s increasingly contested and threatened high security communications systems across the globe.

Airforce Technology Excellence Awards - Nominations Closed

Nominations are now closed for the Airforce Technology Excellence Awards. A big thanks to all the organisations that entered – your response has been outstanding, showcasing exceptional innovation, leadership, and impact.


Excellence in Action
Discover how Virtualitics is transforming mission readiness with explainable AI, predictive maintenance, and data-driven decision intelligence across the U.S. Department of Defense through its AI-powered Integrated Readiness Optimization suite, for which it has won the Innovation and Business Expansion awards.

Discover the Impact