Washington, D.C. — On Wednesday, September 30, 2026, the Export-Import Bank of the United States (EXIM) approved a $468 million direct credit facility for commercial satellite manufacturer Astranis.
Granted under EXIM’s Make More in America (MMIA) initiative, the debt financing provides direct capital rather than a commercial debt guarantee, funding the expansion of domestic spacecraft production and assembly infrastructure in Northern California.
The transaction was arranged with J.P. Morgan’s Securitized Products Group serving as the sole arranger and structuring agent. Additionally, EXIM coordinated with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Office of Strategic Space Finance (OSSF) to align public and private capital deployment across critical domestic space supply chains.
Capital Structure and Production Expansion
The direct loan follows a $450 million equity and debt raise completed by Astranis in May 2026, scaling total institutional capital raised by the company to support commercial and government satellite order backlogs exceeding $1.2 billion.
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| Astranis Production Capital Mix |
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| May 2026 Private Debt & Equity | September 2026 EXIM Direct Loan |
| $450 Million | $468 Million |
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| Facility Target: 153,000 sq. ft. San Francisco Manufacturing Plant |
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The financing supports scaled manufacturing of Astranis’s proprietary MicroGEO satellites—small geostationary communications spacecraft operating across custom frequency allocations—from its 153,000-square-foot facility in San Francisco. The small GEO architecture provides dedicated point-to-point bandwidth as an alternative to large traditional GEO trunking satellites.
In addition to commercial broadband contracts with international operators such as Chunghwa Telecom, Gulf Space Technology, MB Group, and stc group, Astranis serves defense customers, including its prime contractor role on the U.S. Space Force’s Resilient GPS (R-GPS) program.
Executive Perspectives on Domestic Manufacturing
“Maintaining American leadership in space requires the capital to build fast and deliver at scale. This financing is a huge vote of confidence in Astranis to do that,” said John Gedmark, CEO and co-founder of Astranis. “EXIM’s backing provides us with the capital to ramp up production at home, deliver connectivity to customers around the world, and expand our work securing our country’s most valuable assets in GEO.”
“Astranis is delivering mission-critical infrastructure to customers around the world at unprecedented speed and scale,” said EXIM Chairman John Jovanovic. “Under President Trump’s leadership, EXIM will continue to help the United States stay ahead of the curve in developing the industries of the future and boost American competitiveness around the globe.”
Operational Footprint and Fleet Deployment
With five MicroGEO satellites currently deployed in geostationary orbit, Astranis will utilize the EXIM credit facility to accelerate vehicle throughput at its primary integration facility, expanding satellite assembly lines to support simultaneous builds for international telecommunications customers and national security space architectures.
