We've all been imagining what the space industry is going to look like once the International Space Station is de-orbited in 2030. Will there be this booming CIS lunar economy that we keep hearing about? Will there be multiple commercial Leo destinations that are thriving in orbit? You betcha say vast, and they're making progress with their plans for the Haven One Commercial Space Station lab with some big partners in tow. Today is August 1, 2024. I'm Alice Karoo and this is T-minus. Vast unveils plans for its Haven One lab with red wire and ure on board, via Saturn orbit partner on airborne communication platforms, Booz Allen deploys an LLM on the ISS, and our guest today is Brian Miski, principal at KPMG. Brian will be talking to Maria about the future of the space industry. He has some great insights to share, so stay with us for the second part of today's show. Let's dive into today's Intel Briefing, shall we? And we're starting with some news coming out of the ISS RDC conference that Maria is covering this week. Vast have unveiled their plans for the Haven One lab, scheduled to be the world's first microgravity research development and manufacturing platform on a commercial space station. The company says that the Haven One lab will be a hub for companies, governments and other entities to collaborate on science research and in-space manufacturing. And Vast isn't doing it alone. They've got red wire space and ure as its inaugural partners, representing some of the foremost experts in the development of microgravity payloads. Vast is also pursuing payload partnerships in a variety of cutting-edge industries, including semiconductor and advanced material manufacturing, edge computing and machine learning. Smart forward thinking, wouldn't you say? So when will we see this collaboration in action? Vast says that the Haven One lab is set to launch no earlier than the second half of 2025. Yep, next year. Time flies when you're making plans. Viasat has announced a new partnership with Orbit communication systems for the engineering and supply of advanced satellite communication multi-purpose terminals for airborne platforms. This work is expected to significantly enhance performance and access for Viasat customers across diverse satellite networks. The company's plan to integrate Orbit's airborne SATCOM systems across Viasat's global K/A band networks, including their next-generation satellites. The agreement also includes delivery of airborne terminals for military and government use. Booz Allen Hamilton has announced the successful deployment and operation of a Generative AI Large Language Model, or LLM, using Hewlett-Packard Enterprises, Spaceborne Computer 2, onboard the International Space Station. This LLM is believed to be the first one deployed in space and aims to help enable astronauts to use Generative AI without depending on earthbound internet. CACI International has been awarded a 10-year contract valued at up to $450 million to support the US Space Force's Joint Navigation Warfare Centre and the Department of Defence's Centre for Excellence for Navigation Warfare. CACI will provide operational support, joint and operational planning, adversary positioning, navigation and timing capability, and order of battle assessment and other tasks. Northwick Grumman has completed its preliminary design review for 74 high-speed data transport satellites for the Space Development Agency. The satellites integrate advanced technology from an earlier generation of the proliferated warfighter space architecture, providing increased capabilities to US forces. The 74 satellites include the Tranche 2 Beta and Tranche 2 Alpha configurations. To date, SDA has awarded Northwick Grumman more than 130 satellites. Northwick Grumman successfully completed a critical design review for its first-generation transport and tracking-layer satellites last year and is now integrating space vehicles both in California and at the Airbus Factory in Florida. RIVADA Space Networks is expanding its footprint in the US. The Munich-based company has appointed a new Chief Operations Officer, a head of sales for the US and a Deputy Chief Commercial Officer. Declan Ghanley, CEO of RIVADA Space Networks said, "Our strengthened US team allows us to move forward rapidly to achieve our goal of becoming a connectivity disruptor at the forefront of satellite and terrestrial convergence. Good luck to them." Scotland's Orbex has announced a new partnership with space software company Altair. Altair will provide Orbex access to its design and simulation platform, with a focus on structural simulation, composite design and additive manufacturing solutions to support the orbital launch service's provider as it progresses towards its first launch, hopefully in the coming months. Arianne Space is making up for lost time announcing its second launch of the year. The mission which will carry ESA's Copernicus Sentinel-2C satellite is scheduled for liftoff from French Guyana on September 3. The flight will use the final Vega launcher before transitioning to the Vega-C rocket. And Orbital Space has announced its Orbital Space lunar program will send a student-built experiment to the moon. The experiment will be the Arab world's first privately funded lunar mission. Astrobotics will carry the payload on its third lunar mission aboard the Griffin-class lunar lander, targeting launch no earlier than Q4 of 2026. And that concludes today's Intel Briefing. Check out the links in our show notes for further reading on all the stories we've covered today. I've also added an announcement from Umbra on a new SAR satellite offering. Hey T-minus crew, if your business is looking to grow your voice in the industry, expand the reach of your thought leadership or recruit talent, T-minus can help. We'd like to hear from you. Send me an email at space@n2k.com or send us a note through our website so we can connect about building a program to meet your goals. Our guest today is Brian Miski, principal at KPMG. Brian has a lot of experience in forecasting the future of space. So Maria started by asking what are the main areas of influence when looking at the future of the space industry? As we look at the factors of how space policy is going to influence economic policy and ultimately social policy, we have to take almost a little bit of a history lesson to a couple different decades or erratus, right? I would say the first is looking back at the origination of the internet and I see space being at the point of where we are right now just as like 1995. There's some hyperbole around it, but it's much more about, well, how does this apply to my business, my organization, me as an individual or a younger professional? You look at just a 10-year time frame and you look at the explosion of the bubble and we weren't ready for it, right? So we were kind of creating things that were new. That's what's happening right now. So as we look at policy or space, it's really dependent upon two major factors. One, capital markets, the other primarily from a regulatory environment. The regulatory or policy environment is always playing catch up because they don't necessarily see multiple years out. Some do, but it's being able to kind of look at that. The other error that I'm kind of reflecting on is more of how we look at airports today versus the way that we looked at it in the 1950s, right? After Eisenhower looked at the broader transportation system, we looked at the airlines, we looked at how we were moving, how people were moving, not only within the US, but globally. We have to look at spaceports in the same way. There's a whole infrastructure around that and it's really about how are we bringing together the best and the brightest? How are we developing skills, job creation, regional development, economic growth and innovation within these core areas? And this is not just for activity from a low-earth orbit or from a cis-lunar perspective. It's about terrestrial development to actually help build more connectivity to that. And we need to be more intentional about the way we think about space policy as we evolve because geopolitical dynamics, tensions, or let's say more of the global economic environment is going to be driven by a lot of the trade dynamics overall. And we need to be very conscious of how this will evolve based upon different ideologies and everything else. Fine, okay. But let's look at this from an economic perspective. This could be a true element for the US to be bold, courageous in many different areas. And I think there's three phases. I use that decade. I think there's three phases of this policy development as we consider the evolution of space. And again, part of it is the educated hypothesis based upon what's happening today. But if you look at the phases overall, looking at 2025 to 2028, it's really kind of laying the foundation. There are some existing policies, but what do we need to do to help drive the level of integration across space activities as well as regulatory frameworks being connected together? How do we anticipate what will or could happen? There's this scenario planning, a lot of game theory around that, but a lot of that is tied into it. But within that first phase, it's really about establishing the foundation, the groundwork, really laying the groundwork. So that's from a space policy perspective. Economic policy, it's like, what are those incentives from a private investment perspective that can really help drive the space economy? So the space sector is very different than the broader horizontal application of industries across the board. That's the space economy. It's an interesting mental exercise to think like, if there's a way that the space, broader space economy to your point, could start to drive other sectors like an knock on effect that maybe we can't anticipate right now, how do we open that up? Whereas right now, it still seems kind of siloed. How do we encourage that ripple effect? And that's one of the things I'm really happy with what I do on a day-to-day basis now is really about helping organizations uncover the power in their people and possibilities when you think about space and how people can benefit from that. You're really looking at remote sensing, Earth observation data, space-based data, tied with cyber, tied with terrestrial data, tied with market data, tied with the organizational data or Maria, Inc. The data inside of your organization and how are all these things being connected? That's something that's really powerful. We're calling it data fusion. That's leveraging space for Earth. It's leveraging that type of value. So where it's going to create the second and third order effects to your point, that all comes from space, right? And the more that we can actually socialize that and identify what the possibilities are, requires the need to widen your aperture, what this means for your sub-segment of an industry, your organization on the value chain of your industry today versus what it could be five years from now. First is managing to a quarter, managing to a week, right? We're still hyper-focused on that because of the disruption that's going on in the global markets, but will that disruption disappear? No. It's how we're able to anticipate it, leveraging data as well as, dare I say, managing technologies like AI and others, but with the human in the loop, right? And being able to look at different types of considerations. Where do I need to experiment? Versus having a fixed mindset and saying everything will be the same until it's not. That's tough when that happens. That guarantees extinction basically for a lot of businesses. Yeah. But that's what we're seeing. And you think about the other industries and you look at manufacturing and assembly and space and what is the roadmap to that. I know there's efforts going on right now to determine what that is and policies will come out of that. Robotics. Robotics is probably the most underappreciated sub-segment of a segment that we're seeing in technology, not just being combined with AI or IoT or different other types of technologies, but what does that mean from a level of automation or information? I don't think we're thinking collectively as innovators with the innovative mindset about what that could be. You've painted this very interesting vision for the future and it is an interesting challenge to think about how we get there from here. How do we do that? Part of it is embracing some of the elements. Think about it as this approach just as I outlined the policy environment or what I envisioned the policy environment could be. Starting with data. That's the white blood of what everyone is using today. That's the core focus. AI can't run without data. But that's something that most organizations can really focus on in general. I know I'm just speaking from an organizational perspective, but even looking at governments or different types of organizations can be using it. But earth-based observation data, remote sensing, which ties into IoT and sensors, there's a whole sensor economy that is going to be proliferating, why we need sensors in my washing machine. I don't know. But it's actually helping organizations anticipate. It's helping individuals anticipate. If Maria, who may be my washer, is monitoring all the washers that are distributing, and when I say monitoring, just looking at the efficiency, something is happening within this area within New England. Since we're using that as an analogy, then there may be some type of remote fix that can be distributed just as we have smartphone updates and everything else. What does that mean that could be just beamed to that? I haven't even gotten into energy generation. Another very interesting sector with so much going on, especially now. So much going on. And thinking about that, that's why we need to look at how space policies can actually help reshape the policy environment to meet the global trends right now. It's not vice versa. We need to incrementally grow, but we need to be bold and have some courage in specific areas. As we look at how we're embracing that new report that just came out in April from the World Economic Forum, $1.8 trillion by 2035. Okay. Well, that's going to require some heavy lifting from a policy perspective, looking at making it more attractive from capital markets. You look at private equity, and they are looking at more of integration play. These are the elements where we need to not just reimagine, but apply some critical thinking about what is the pathway or roadmap to achieve that. And it starts with data. It then transfers to more of how you're part of the infrastructure. Space ports are part of it. The launch infrastructure across the US is part of it. And standards need to be developed, right? Because we have the Artemis Accords, which is grandiose and such a great thing. How does that start to cascade down to more of a economic policy, social policy that play into space overall? We really need to think about, you know, quite frankly, STEM and training and education for our children, future children in general, just thinking about what is their role within the context of humanity, but also within the US. You have to look back at history to kind of look at inflection points and what could we be doing differently or better? And part of it is looking from a social perspective at underserved communities, from a geography perspective, you know, breaking different types of boundaries across the board. Education and job creation helps drive economic development. It helps drive prosperity to where all boats rise, right? That's something where I think these elements come together. It's not just far off at, you know, the Carmen line. That's where I'm dealing. It is bringing it down to earth and making it pragmatic for people to appreciate the opportunity that we have in front of us. We'll be right back. Welcome back. Space debris and how to avoid it is a multi-billion dollar business. A new report from Research and Market says that the global market for space situation awareness is estimated at $1.3 billion in 2023 and is projected to reach $1.9 billion by 2030. Who knew that trash could pay so well? It's big business because it's a big problem. The US Space Surveillance Network is tracking about 25,000 objects in orbit that are larger than 10 centimetres, but it's estimated that there's up to one million pieces of debris, most ranging much smaller in sizes, causing problems in Leo. So what's the industry doing about it? Well, there are many commercial companies looking at tracking and deorbitating debris, but NASA is seeking non-traditional strategies focused on preventing a predictive collision without complete removal of the objects involved. The US Space Agency is funding research at Virginia Tech, for example, which is exploring a novel approach to just-in-time collision avoidance strategy. Assistant Professor Riley Fitzgerald's research is focused on utilizing targeted dust cloud deployments, or a plume of fine material, from orbital platforms to avert predicted collisions. Fitzgerald says that, quote, "The goal of any remediation plan is to reduce long-term risk to spacecraft and humans operating in orbit, specifically the risk of debris collision." Removal of existing debris requires significant cost and effort. An alternative approach is to use targeted dust clouds to slightly alter the orbital path when there is a notice of a potential collision. Let's hope that the $600,000 grant that he's received is put to good use. I mean, I'm all for avoiding dust, but at some point someone needs to sweep up the trash. That's it for T-miners for August 1, 2024, brought to you by N2K Cyberwire. For additional resources from today's report, check out our show notes at space.n2k.com. We've privileged that N2K and podcast site T-miners are part of the daily routine of many of the most influential leaders and operators in the public and private sector, from the Fortune 500 to many of the world's preeminent intelligence and law enforcement agencies. T-miners' associate producer is Liz Stoats. We're mixed by Elliot Peltzman and Trey Hester with original music by Elliot Peltzman. Our executive producer is Jen Iben. Our executive editor is Brandon Carr. Simone Petrella is our president. Peter Kilpie is our publisher. And I'm our standing host and producer, Alice Caruth. Murray, we'll be back tomorrow. Thanks for listening. T-miners. [BLANK_AUDIO]
