Herndon contractor to acquire NG division for $327M
Herndon tech and management contractor Serco Inc. has agreed to acquire Northrop Grumman‘s mission training and satellite ground network communications software business (MT&S) for approximately $327 million. Serco Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of United Kingdom-based Serco Group, announced the deal Wednesday, which is expected to close in mid-2025. MT&S provides the U.S. military [...]
OpTech expanding Loudoun satellite plant
Optimum Technologies, a Sterling space flight hardware designer and manufacturer, plans to expand its Loudoun County satellite manufacturing plant, a project expected to create 40 jobs, Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced Monday. Known as OpTech, the company will invest $999,000 in the expansion, according to the governor’s office. OpTech was founded in Virginia in 2015 and […]
Herndon’s Akima wins $480M Space Force contract
The U.S. Department of Defense has awarded Five Rivers Analytics, a subsidiary of Herndon-based government contractor Akima, an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract worth up to $480 million over 10 years, Akima announced last week. Based in Colorado, Five Rivers Analytics provides classified IT and mission support services and bills itself as “a small business backed by […]
Intelsat to be acquired by SES for $3.1B
McLean-based satellite services provider Intelsat announced Tuesday that it has made a deal to be acquired by SES, a Luxembourg-based competitor, for $3.1 billion in cash. The deal is expected to close during the second half of 2025, depending on regulatory clearances and other factors, according to a news release. Intelsat CEO David Wajsgras will […]
McLean’s Iridium closes on Satelles deal
McLean-based Iridium Communications, a global satellite communications company, has completed its previously announced acquisition of Satelles, a Reston-based provider of satellite-based time and location services that assist GPS and global navigation satellite systems (GNSS), the company announced Tuesday. Iridium first announced the acquisition in March. The positioning, navigation and timing se[...]
Intelsat strikes $250M deal with Eutelsat Group
McLean-based satellite services provider Intelsat has committed to secure low-Earth orbit service for six years for $250 million from Paris-based Eutelsat Group’s OneWeb low-Earth orbit (LEO) constellation service, with an option for another $250 million, Intelsat announced Tuesday. “We’ve been partnering with Eutelsat for quite some time now, leveraging its OneWeb LEO constellation [...]
Charlottesville’s Astraea acquired by Fla. satellite company
Astraea, a Charlottesville-based geospatial analytics firm, has been acquired by Nuview, a Florida-based company developing a satellite imaging constellation, the companies announced Tuesday. Financial terms of the deal were not available. Founded as a for-profit benefit corporation in 2016, Astraea applies data science and artificial intelligence to analyze imaging and sensor data gathered from E[...]
HawkEye 360 promotes COO to president
HawkEye 360’s chief operating officer has been promoted to president, the Herndon-based satellite analytics company announced Tuesday. Rob Rainhart joined HawkEye 360 as vice president of engineering in 2016, a few months after the company’s 2015 founding, and has served as its chief operating officer since 2019. His new role as president is effective immediately. […]
Telecommunications 2023: MATTHEW J. DESCH
Iridium launched five spare satellites in May, completing its plans to upgrade the resilience of its constellation of communication satellites. It now has 66 operational crosslinked satellites and 14 spares. Iridium’s mobile voice and data satellite communications network is used in ships, planes and land vehicles and for Internet of Things systems. For fiscal year […]
Telecommunications 2023: DAVID C. WAJSGRAS
Wajsgras took over as CEO of Intelsat in April 2022 soon after the McLean-based satellite operator’s emergence from Chapter 11 bankruptcy and financial restructuring. A little more than a year later, in June 2023, news surfaced that merger talks between Intelsat and its Luxembourg-based competitor SES had been called off. Last year, Intelsat deployed emergency communications […]
Satellite internet improves mobile health care
The Health Wagon got its start in 1980 when Sister Bernadette Kenny, a nurse practitioner, began dispensing free, much-needed health care to people in rural Appalachia from her Volkswagen Beetle. “She was thinking outside the box,” says Health Wagon President and CEO Teresa Tyson. Kenny served as inspiration, Tyson says, when the health care […]
Federal Contractors | Technology 2023: JOHN SERAFINI
Serafini founded his geospatial analytics company in 2015. From its constellation of satellites, HawkEye 360 collects radio frequency data that can identify and track human activity and trends for military, maritime and intelligence clients. It has helped detect illegal fishing for the Australian government, and in Ukraine, it tracked Russian troop movements. Last year, Serafini […]