DENVER, CO — Driving forward its aggressive campaign to harden national security assets against electronic warfare threats, the U.S. Space Force has officially finalized a $514 million contract modification with Lockheed Martin Space.
The award greenlights the defense giant to begin production on Global Positioning System IIIF (GPS IIIF) Space Vehicles 23 and 24, bringing the military’s total commitment for the next-generation IIIF line to 14 spacecraft.
The contract aims to rapidly modernize the baseline positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) network that underpins both civilian infrastructure and frontline military hardware, replacing legacy satellites that have drifted past their original design lifespans.
Neutralizing Adversarial Jamming
The defining upgrade built into the GPS IIIF block is a massive focus on survivability in contested theaters. As geopolitical adversaries routinely deploy dense network spoofing and electronic signal blocking across active combat zones, standard positioning feeds can become highly compromised.
The newly funded Space Vehicles 23 and 24 will combat this via advanced Regional Military Protection (RMP) architecture. This tactical payload provides an unprecedented 63-fold increase in core anti-jamming capabilities, focusing concentrated, secure M-Code-enabled signals exactly where warfighters require them to bypass localized jamming blankets.
“Modernizing the constellation with highly resilient, next-generation space vehicles ensures warfighters have access to the GPS capabilities they require for their missions,” said Christina Mancinelli, vice president of global communications and navigation at Lockheed Martin.
The technical specifications for these newly funded satellites include:
- The LM2100 Combat Bus™: An evolved, heavily cyber-hardened spacecraft platform featuring enhanced power generation, refined onboard electronics, and modular payload capacity to allow for future technical upgrades.
- Digital Navigation Payloads: Advanced digital transmitters engineered to drastically tighten the accuracy and reliability of the global navigation stream.
- Universal Civil Broadcasts: The satellites will simultaneously transmit all approved civilian positioning signals—including the interoperable L1C and L5 bands—beneficial for commercial aviation, telecommunications networks, and global banking systems.
Dual-Twin Digital Assembly
The Space Force’s half-billion-dollar injection secures continuous workflow at Lockheed Martin’s premier satellite assembly facilities in the Denver, Colorado region. To hit the military’s strict delivery window, the company is bypassing traditional assembly bottlenecks through the implementation of advanced software-defined tooling, including virtual reality validation overlays and real-time digital twins of the hardware chassis.
Lockheed Martin confirmed it has already achieved the core mate milestone—the official industrial “birth”—for three of its previously ordered GPS IIIF satellites, with the remaining spacecraft progressing through varied stages of active assembly. This manufacturing push is paired with a separate, recent $105 million Space Force award designated entirely to modernizing the corresponding GPS ground segment networks.
