SCOUT Space Inc. has been granted a Phase II SBIR contract through AFWERX, the Technology Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) and the innovation arm of the Department Air Force. SCOUT will work with AFRL/RIE (Intelligence Systems Division) and the Space Operations Command (SpOC) Delta 2 to advance classical space domain awareness (SDA) metric observation tasking and catalog augmentation using space-based sensing.
SCOUT’s dual-use space sensing technology will be validated in enhancing the United States Space Force‘s (USSF) delivery of timely, responsive, and secure data on the space domain to the warfighter. SCOUT will demonstrate data protocol and platform integration development which will speed the certificates to field this capability.
This project will refine the concepts of operations applicable to Delta 2 and AFRL/RIE missions using dual-use tasking, processing, and exploitation of space-based observations of resident space objects.
In March of 2022, SCOUT announced the signing of a Commercial SSA Data Sharing Agreement with USSPACECOM that includes the 18th Space Defense Squadron under Delta-2.
SCOUT is currently a participant in the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) Accelerator’s third cohort, which has involved refinement of its space-based data frameworks.
“SCOUT capabilities enable more persistent coverage of objects in orbit without the blackout periods associated with legacy terrestrial sensing. Our Phase II effort with Delta-2 and AFRL/RIE is an opportunity to demonstrate the value-add of proliferative sensing solutions to the operational dataset,” said Sergio Gallucci, Co-founder and CTO of SCOUT. “We’re proving out different operational concepts for SDA which have not been feasible before now, given space object simulation requirements and architectural implementation challenges. The SpOC mission requires more dynamic and operationalized data, and our team’s space-based data offerings seek to fill those gaps.”
“We have gaps in our SDA enterprise and we are always in pursuit of new capabilities to fill those gaps,” said Col. Marc Brock, Commander of Space Force Delta 2. “SCOUT’s unclassified, space-based non-Earth imaging capability and automatically generated commercial analytic products and services have potential to become critical enablers for Delta 2’s mission.”
SCOUT Space was founded in 2019 with the mission to enable a new era of space safety and transparency. SCOUT’s in-space products and services, first launched in June 2021, allow spacecraft to see and understand things around them. The orbital distributed sensor network developed by SCOUT will significantly improve Space Domain Awareness (SDA) and ensure responsible use of the space environment. The company is a Techstars, MassChallenge, and venture-backed startup with ongoing government contracts and commercial paid pilots. SCOUT holds the Established® 2021 Startup of the Year® title. For more information, visit www.scout.space.
