Atlas to Develop Space Domain Awareness Capability Under SBIR Phase II Contract

Atlas Space Operations has won a Small Business Innovation Research Phase II award to enhance its space domain awareness capabilities for monitoring satellite launches, minimizing collision risks and various defense and intelligence applications. Leveraging unused antenna time on its global ground network, Atlas will conduct radio frequency observations of space assets. According to Mike Carey, co-founder and chief operating officer, the project fits with the company’s focus on software solutions to hardware limitations. Carey added that SDA activities match with broader growth goals in the public and private sector markets, Atlas said Friday.

The contract adds to a string of awards for the Traverse City, Michigan-based company in recent months. In June, Atlas was tasked by the Defense Innovation Unit to employ its Freedom Network Management Platform as a new means for the Department of Defense and civil and commercial platforms to communicate and transfer data. The company won the deal as part of DIU’s Hybrid Space Architecture program, which aims to provide wide and secure internet connectivity in space to commercial, civil and military users, including international partners.

In July, Atlas won an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to support the agency’s climate research with space communications services by leveraging its Freedom and Global Antenna Network platforms. The company had been supporting missions undertaken by NOAA’s National Environmental Satellite Data and Information Service since 2017.