Commercial Satellites To Enhance Military Radio Communications

The Space Development Agency (SDA) has awarded AST SpaceMobile USA a $30 million contract for a demonstration that will use commercial satellites to communicate directly with US military radios. The project, part of SDA’s Hybrid Acquisition for proliferated Low-earth Orbit (HALO) program, aims to validate the use of commercial platforms for tactical satellite communication capability. AST SpaceMobile will utilize its BlueBird constellation of cellular broadband satellites to provide communications with military radios as a service. The award was announced by Breaking Defense.