What Happened
Commercial Radar Capabilities Expand US Government's Intelligence Reach
The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) has awarded contracts to Capella Space, Iceye U.S., and Umbra to expand the US government’s use of commercial synthetic aperture radar (SAR). The contracts, awarded under NRO’s Commercial Radar Capabilities program, will provide all-weather, day and night imaging to support a wide range of national security and humanitarian missions. This development is part of the NRO’s strategy to build a more resilient and responsive overhead architecture, leveraging the rapid innovation occurring in the commercial space sector. The awards were reported by SpaceNews.