[MUSIC PLAYING] Today is August 12, 2025. I'm Maria Varmazis, and this is T-minus. [MUSIC PLAYING] T-minus. 22nd to LOS, T-dred. Open aboard. [INAUDIBLE] [MUSIC PLAYING] [INAUDIBLE] [MUSIC PLAYING] Five. Leolab says entered into a space act agreement with NASA to evaluate the company's data and determine its applications for new NASA conjunction assessment missions. Four. NASA selects Cambrian works and catalyst space technologies to develop concept design studies for a possible orbit boost for the Neil Garrell's Swift Observatory. Three. The European Space Agency is deliberating moves to become less dependent on NASA programs. Two. In space, has selected a consortium led by Pixel Space to build a commercial sovereign constellation of Earth observation satellites. One. Rocket Lab has completed the acquisition of the parent holding company of Geost. [MUSIC PLAYING] Lift off. [MUSIC PLAYING] Our guest today is Bryce Kennedy, Space Connectivity Senior Officer at the International Telecommunications Union. Bryce and producer Alice Carruth discussed emerging space economies and the role of the ITU. Find out more after today's headlines. [MUSIC PLAYING] Happy Tuesday, everybody. Thanks for joining me. Let's dive into today's briefing, shall we? Rocket Lab has completed the acquisition of the parent holding company of Geost. The acquisition, which was first announced in May, was completed for $275 million before closing adjustments, comprising approximately $125 million in cash and over 3 million shares of Rocket Lab common stock with an additional potential earnout of up to $50 million tied to future revenue targets of Geost's business. Geost's technology support missile warning and tracking, tactical intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, Earth observation, and space domain awareness. Rocket Lab says that with the acquisition now complete, the company is now better positioned to bid for US national security programs such as the Golden Dome and the space development agency's proliferated war fighter space architecture. Geost will continue to operate in Arizona and Virginia, expanding Rocket Lab's footprint across North America. The Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Center, known as InSpace, has selected a consortium led by Pixel Space to build a commercial homegrown constellation of Earth observation satellites. InSpace has invested more than 12 billion rupees, which amounts to nearly $137 million over the next five years for this project. The consortium also includes Peersite Space, Satur Analytics India, and Druva Space. And together they will design, build, and operate the satellites. The constellation aims to reduce India's dependence on foreign systems, including the widely used US global positioning system. And India is not the only nation looking to pull back dependence on United States technology. The European Space Agency's Director General, Josef Ossbacher, has told media that Europe needs to become less dependent on NASA's tech and exploration programs if it wants to keep its status as a major space power. The warning comes following proposed NASA budget cuts, which have a direct impact on ESAS programs. Around 95% of ESAS total 7.7 billion euro annual budget is independent of decisions made in the United States. But roughly half of the 600 million euro allotted for human and robotic exploration this year relies on NASA's current spending plans. ESAS will be reassessing funding and international partnerships when the members meet in November to set ESAS's next three-year budget. NASA is exploring an opportunity to demonstrate technology to raise a spacecraft's orbit to a higher altitude. If any of you caught the last episode of the Aerospace Corporation's monthly NEXUS segment with us here on T-minus, then this is sounding very good for cosmic. And if you didn't catch the segment, well, we've added a link in the show notes called European VV-27 Victory, so you can go and take a listen. In any case, the US Space Agency has selected Camry & Werks and Catalyst Space Technologies to develop concept design studies for a possible orbit boost for the agency's Neil Garrell's SWIFT Observatory. The spacecraft's lower orbit has been decaying gradually since its launch in 2004. And NASA says this lowering orbit presents an opportunity for the space agency to advance a US industry capability while potentially extending the science lifetime of the SWIFT mission. The concept studies will help determine whether extending SWIFT's critical scientific capabilities would be more cost-effective than replacing those capabilities with a new observatory. And Leo Labs has entered into a Space Act agreement with NASA to evaluate the company's data and determine its applications for new NASA conjunction assessment, or CA, missions. Under the agreement NASA's conjunction assessment risk analysis or CARA program, which performs CA for NASA, will receive Leo Labs' satellite metric observations and radar cross-section data, orbit determination and orbital safety products, and more. NASA will test Leo Labs' data to ensure that it can integrate with the Department of Defense's Space Surveillance Network tracking data to produce a combined CA solution. And that just about wraps up today's top five stories. But as always, there is so much more going on in the space industry. And 2K senior producer Alice Carruth joins us now with some of the other stories that we are watching. Alice, don't we have a few launches later today? At the time of recording, there are two big launches on the schedule. Ariane 6 returns to the skies this evening with the Metop SGA1. Lift-off is expected at 9.37 PM local time from Europe's spaceport in French Guiana. And here in the US, we're going to be watching ULA's Vulcan lift-off from Cape Penavel just before 8 PM Eastern. Vulcan will be carrying a pair of US Space Force national security satellites to Geo. We'll have more on both those launches on tomorrow's show. And what else have we got linked in today's selected reading section? We have three additional stories in there for you today. AST Space Mobile released their Q2 results. Black Sky has secured a contract extension from an unnamed customer. And Redwire has announced updates to its Acorn 2.0 software product. And a reminder, those links can also be found on our website, which is space.ntuk.com. Hey, T-minus crew, if you're just joining us, be sure to follow T-minus Space Daily in your favorite podcast app. Also, please do us a favor and share the intel with your friends and coworkers. A growing audience is the most important thing for us, and we would love your help as part of the T-minus crew. So if you find T-minus useful, please share so other professionals like you can find the show. Thank you so much. It means a lot to me and all of us here at T-minus. [MUSIC PLAYING] Our guest is Bryce Kennedy, the space connectivity senior officer at the International Telecommunication Union. Bryce spoke to producer Al Scrooge about what attracted him to his role at ITU. When I got into the space industry, I remember talking to a White House-- I think he was on the Space Council many, many, many years ago when it was first stood up. So it was an older gentleman. I go, I want to work for the most powerful, influential, impactful organization in space. Because is it SpaceX? Is it NASA? He's like, no, it's an organization you've never heard of. And I'm like, OK, tell you that European space, Jack's a-- tell me. He's like, it's the ITU. I'm like, what? And he goes, yes, an international telecommunication union. He's like, they are really the bedrock of all space. He's like, if you could imagine oxygen in space, they are the people that control that and really ensure that the world participates at this holistic, equal level. They are in charge of all the radio frequency for the world. I was established in 1860 with the advent of the telegraph. And I have to give credit where credit's due, the fact that it has been this longstanding, that the world, no nation, can circumvent the ITU and the way that they regulate spectrum and hand it out and then also work with orbital cells and all kinds of stuff. Every nation participates at some level with the ITU. She's really impressive. They must be pretty busy at the moment because we've gone from what a handful of satellites really to tens of thousands at this point in the last, maybe, what, 10 years? It really has rapidly grown. How are they managing that when they've got such a huge player with the US, but then we're starting to see a lot more sovereign nations bringing satellites on board? Again, when you're an organization from 1860, you have to be used to adapting to current climate. So moving from telegraph to satellites alone is a massive change. And so I work primarily with the developing sector. And one of the things that I'm seeing that the ITU is really starting to leverage is that history. So working with developing nations to understand what spectrum usage is, what the best management structures are, even down to space agency, best practices, policy and regulatory schema, the whole thing. And yeah, really pulling in that history to help inform the future of space. You must do a lot of traveling with this kind of role. Speaking of your working with the developing nations, what are you seeing in those developing nations? What are you expecting in the coming years? There's a massive, massive uptake in terms of these countries that want to participate. And I think one of the things that we're starting to see is maybe in the beginning-- and I could be wrong with this-- but in the beginning, I think we use the US as the blueprint to what, like I said before, a regulatory licensing schema looked like even down to kind of a NASA type space agency. But back to understanding, the basic principle in business is what? Know your customer. And each nation, their quote unquote customer, their population, their infrastructure, their desires, that whatever, know the customer of that group of people. And so one of the things that I, to you, is doing is really helping bring this global perspective of different institutional knowledge from Roscosmos to Jackson to the ESA to NASA to FCC to other countries' versions of that. And having those conversations to see what fits best with those countries, because the one thing we want to make sure is that everyone that participates is really aligned with their core values of that country, and then also the broader legacy of space. One of the great missions that I went on was to Mongolia for-- it was the Landlock Developing Country Summit. And one of the things-- it was so beautiful to see, hey, Mongolia, I forget what percentage, 40% or 50%, maybe even higher, of the population is nomadic. And we get what we need, we need this footprint in space, but also this is your population. So we were able to really understand at the ground level of what those Landlock countries needed. I'd love you to talk a bit more about what you found out in Mongolia. It must have been quite an experience to see how-- why are they looking at space? Is it for technological advancements? Is it so they can have telehealth, for example? What is it you're seeing when you're going to places like Mongolia? Mongolia is really-- they're pushing the tech infrastructure. So the mining is a really big thing. But with that, they're also pushing themselves to be technologically up-to-date and futuristic, and a hub for that. One-- it's so funny is they really love there. And I love this about this, because they're not forgetting their past. So they have a Genghis Khan, that global kind of mission to-- I wouldn't say take over the world-- but that ability to lead in their past. And they're bringing that mentality that is just baked into their ethos, into the future, and they're doing it through tech. And so one of the things is making sure that should their people really start to move in that direction and then start to pull in people from around the globe, that they want to be at the forefront of that. And I have to say, and I forget the name of their version of the FCC, but their group that leads that is really pushing that. Because again, they have the nomadic groups. They have the historical culture and all this other stuff. But at the same time, they really see that this is the forward trend. And just leading with that, as opposed to-- I don't know. I see some countries really going the opposite. We're like, how space is improving? And we don't need that. We have terrestrial lines. We'll just focus on that. And yeah, it's just-- and even having the Landlock Developing Countries Summit was, to me, very revolutionary, because they were able to share insights. They were able to say, I think it was the louse who put up a satellite. And they were able to just say, maybe we want to start sharing spectrum usage and all these different things. And really pull each other in as a group where they could start to have a-- again, back to this thing, knowing your customer, right? And looking at what works for them, as opposed to, I don't know, a generic blueprint. I guess that brings me to the event that you guys are advertising coming up in October in Geneva. It's about space sustainability. What is ITU doing getting involved in space sustainability and space domain awareness? Yeah, so we have the Space Sustainability Forum. Last year was the first year. And it just goes to show you that what the ITU is still able to, in terms of pull in from just an idea of, like, hey, we need to start having these conversations. We understand our three roles of regulation standardization in developing countries. But let's pull in at a global level, in one area, key players to go deeper into this subject. So again, we can start harnessing that information and understanding best practices at the ITU level and then at the nation level. And so this will be the second year. It's going to be much bigger. There's going to be a host of really, really diverse and dynamic speakers that are going to pull in everything from the regulation policy, from launch, from spectrum usage, from the youth advisory board. We have all kinds of different inputs that I would say would take a global organization like the ITU to be able to host something so dynamic and so diverse where we can really get down to brass tacks and see how we can ensure that sustainability is, quote unquote, sustainable. It's one thing to throw out these metrics in this chest banging. We need to make sure whatever sustainability means. And I think even the ITU is pulling back of what does sustainability mean? Well, what does it mean for each country, for each participant, not just coming with a traditional blueprint of, let's say, space debris or something like that? Then they're broadening that messaging, broadening that definition through the input of the member states. And yeah, like I said, I give them a lot of credit because most people would default to maybe adhere to a definition of that. ITU is definitely not too good. [MUSIC PLAYING] We'll be right back. Welcome back. There is a new research article published on August 4th in the proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences titled, The Entities Enabling Scientific Fraud at Scale, Are Large, Resilient, and Growing Rapidly. And for those of us outside the world of science and academia, the term scientific fraud probably raises some question marks. Why would anyone bother faking scientific research or publishing in a dodgy scientific-esque journal when surely at some point the truth catches up to you, right? Well, as is so often the way for unscrupulous things, the reason, says the article's authors, is money. You get better jobs, better access, and better recognition the more you author papers based on your research or have your papers cited. And if your future depends on these things happening and there's a way to get a leg up if you just fake it, well, yeah, people are doing that. From the article itself, and I quote, "Increasing inequality in resource accessibility may be contributing to the increasing scale of scientific fraud. However, even when provided with resources, research remains a high-risk activity. One does not know a priori whether a study will be successful or not. Why risk failure, jeopardizing one's career, when for a relatively small fee one can easily acquire the publications and citations that would otherwise require an immense amount of labor?" Why indeed? And Keith Cooper at space.com asked a question for all of us to ponder right now, is astronomy safe from these kinds of pressures for scientific fraud? Traditionally, space sciences were not big money makers compared to the sciences that might yield lucrative material science or medical breakthroughs. But space is in the geopolitical limelight right now, and we are in a bit of a space race 2.0. So it does stand to reason, says Cooper, that we should expect to see an uptick in scientific fraud in the space sciences as well, unfortunately. And the authors of the research fraud study stated their concern that junk science is being published in junk pseudo journals, and that is all fast outpacing legitimate science and peer-reviewed publications. So much so that it's going to drown out the real stuff. And when you add in, oh, you knew I was going to say it, artificial intelligence to the mix? Being trained on fake scientific research, well, it is just slop all the way down. And that's T-Mine as brought to you by N2K Cyberwire. We'd love to know what you think of this podcast. Your feedback ensures we deliver the insights that keep you a step ahead in the rapidly changing space industry. If you like our show, please share a reading and review in your podcast app. Please also fill out the survey in the show notes or send an email to space@n2k.com. We're proud that N2K Cyberwire is part of the daily routine 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. N2K helps space and cybersecurity professionals grow, learn, and stay informed. As the nexus for discovery and connection, we bring you the people, the technology, and the ideas shaping the future of secure innovation. Learn how at N2K.com. N2K's senior producer is Alice Carruth. Our producer is Liz Stokes. We are mixed by Elliot Peltzman and Tre Hester with original music by Elliot Peltzman. Our executive producer is Jennifer Eiben. Peter Kilpie is our publisher, and I am your host, Maria Varmazis. Thanks for listening. See you tomorrow. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] T-minus. [MUSIC PLAYING] (water splashing) [BLANK_AUDIO]
