Space Development Agency
U.S. federal agency
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| 2025 | Planned deployment of Tranche 1 Tracking Layer satellites in Low Earth Orbit, with two contractors each building 14 satellites capable of tracking hypersonic missiles by their heat signatures. |
| September 2024 | SDA plans to launch 126 satellites (42 satellites from each of 3 firms) in the Tranche 1 Transport Layer, forming a mesh network of small LEO satellites with 4 optical links per satellite. |
| February 2024 | By this date, the SDA had successfully deployed 38 satellites into orbit, advancing its goal of establishing a large satellite constellation. |
| February 15 2024 | Four L3Harris Tracking satellites launched as rideshare payloads on the USSF-124 mission, after experiencing previous production delays. |
| January 16 2024 | Announced $2.5 billion award to three vendors for preliminary fire control satellites in the Tranche 2 Tracking Layer, each to provide 18 satellites with infrared cameras. |
| November 21 2023 | Demonstrated Link 16 connectivity between Five Eyes nations via Low Earth Orbit Tranche 0 satellites from November 21-27. |
| September 2 2023 | Second Tranche 0 launch carried 13 more satellites, with one Transport satellite from York excluded for software testing. |
| June 2023 | Released RFP for Tranche 2 Alpha satellites. |
| April 2023 | Released Request for Proposal (RFP) for Tranche 2 Beta satellites in the second week of April. |
| April 2 2023 | First Tranche 0 launch of 10 satellites into low earth orbit, demonstrating responsive communication links for the Transport layer of the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA). |
| March 2023 | Launch delayed to March after York Space Systems retrofitted filters on 8 satellites at no cost to the government. |
| 2022 | Awarded contracts to York Space Systems, Lockheed Martin Space, and Northrop Grumman Space Systems for Tranche 1 satellites. |
| December 2022 | Initial launch of 10 SDA satellites was originally scheduled, but delayed due to identified issues with power supply noise in 8 satellites. |
| December 29 2022 | President Joe Biden signed the FY23 omnibus appropriations act, which introduced new reporting and certification requirements for the Pentagon's Mid-Tier Acquisitions (MTAs) and rapid prototype programs, potentially impacting the Space Development Agency's acquisition strategies. |
| October 2022 | The Space Development Agency (SDA) came under the management of the United States Space Force. |
| 2021 | Launched experimental satellites including Mandrake 2, the Laser Interconnect and Networking Communications System (LINCS), and the Prototype On-orbit Experimental Testbed (POET). |
| 2021 | Solicited bids for Tranche 1 satellites, with first launch expected in September 2024. |
| October 2020 | SDA selected SpaceX and L3Harris Technologies to develop four satellites each for detecting and tracking ballistic and hypersonic missiles. |
| August 2020 | SDA awarded its first contracts to Lockheed Martin ($188 million) and York Space Systems ($94 million) to build 10 data relay satellites for its transport layer. |
| 2019 | Space Development Agency (SDA) established by Mike Griffin under President Donald Trump's administration, with a focus on developing low Earth orbit constellations for missile defense and tracking capabilities. |
This contents of the box above is based on material from the Wikipedia article Space Development Agency, which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.