Space Kinetic's $50M 🛰️, $244M for Palantir 🕶️, Astranis's GEO spysat 👁️

Space Kinetic wins $50M Space Force OTA for fuel-free satellite maneuver

Venture-backed Space Kinetic, which raised a $12 million seed in 2025, won a $50 million Space Force OTA, its largest yet, for its Whirlwind maneuver system. Whirlwind slings low-cost, ruggedized micro-satellites off a host spacecraft at high velocity without consumable fuel, promising extreme agility for a new class of cheap space vehicles. A $50M OTA to a seed-stage firm shows the Space Force routing real money to startups through rapid pathways, and treating on-orbit maneuver as a priority buy.

DARPA funds quantum-networking startup Qunnect

DARPA awarded Brooklyn-based Qunnect new, undisclosed funding to advance its Carina quantum-networking platform, targeting a next-generation node that corrects photon polarization in real time over fiber. Stable polarization is a core reliability barrier for quantum networks, which promise tap-proof links and distributed sensing prized by defense and intelligence users. Non-dilutive DARPA capital to a venture-backed specialist signals quantum networking is moving from lab demos toward fieldable, resilient infrastructure.

Space Force taps five vendors to prove multi-vendor optical satellite links

The Space Force gave Amazon LEO for Government, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Rocket Lab, and York Space Systems $12 million each to demonstrate cross-operator connectivity. A separate $2 million OTA seeds the five to build "space exchange point" payloads, laying groundwork for optical laser terminals that let rival vendors' satellites talk on orbit. Interoperability is the hard part of any mega-constellation; funding a vendor-neutral optical backbone signals the Space Force wants a network, not five walled gardens.

Parsons wins $70M to expand air base air defense across Europe and Africa

Parsons won a $70 million ceiling task order under the Air Force's Air Base Air Defense program to integrate, field, and sustain point-defense systems across the USAFE-AFAFRICA theater. The four-year award covers counter-UAS and other defenses for personnel, aircraft, and installations against emerging aerial threats, extending Parsons' existing ABAD role. Base defense is a fast-growing line as cheap drones threaten fixed sites, and ceiling task orders like this are how the Air Force scales C-UAS without new starts.

Astranis unveils Perceptor, a maneuvering GEO surveillance satellite

Astranis unveiled Perceptor, a space-domain-awareness satellite built on its already-flying MicroGEO bus, at the Space and Missile Defense Symposium. Using electric propulsion, Perceptor can reposition across the geostationary belt more than a dozen times per mission to inspect allied and adversary spacecraft. The move pushes Astranis beyond broadband into military SDA, where it will vie against 13 rivals for the Space Force's $6.24 billion Andromeda program.

Pentagon memo directs up to $244M in no-bid work to Palantir

An internal memo from Deputy Defense Secretary Steve Feinberg, subject line "Funding Palantir," directs the Pentagon to fund up to $243.9 million in Palantir services through March 2027. DefenseScoop reports the directive was shaped by the nascent BOND — Business Operators for National Defense — program and fast-tracks Palantir's software without competition. A named, no-bid carve-out for a single vendor is unusual on paper, and signals how far leadership will bend acquisition rules to scale software it deems mission-critical.

Trump orders steam catapults, foreign-built warships, fifth shipyard

A Trump national-security memorandum directs the Navy to drop electromagnetic launch on future Ford-class carriers, starting with the Doris Miller, and return to steam catapults. The same memo clears the way for foreign-built warships and orders a fifth public shipyard for submarine repair, with Hegseth given 60 days to plan. Allowing overseas construction is the bigger industrial shock: it concedes US yards cannot meet demand, while ripping out EMALS reopens work for legacy catapult suppliers.

CENTCOM stands up its first multinational attack-drone task force

US Central Command launched Task Force Falcon Strike, its first multinational unit dedicated to one-way attack drones and uncrewed air, surface, and subsea systems. It follows Scorpion Strike, CENTCOM's US-only OWA drone squadron stood up nine months ago, amid an ongoing war with Iran that has drained precision munitions. A standing, allied one-way-attack-drone command is a durable demand signal for attritable-strike makers — recurring operational pull, not a one-off buy.

Form Energy raised a $750M Series G led by T. Rowe Price for 100-hour iron-air grid batteries.

Surveillance dronemaker Tekever is in talks to raise at a €5.5 billion valuation, Bloomberg reported.

Rocket Lab cleared US antitrust review and filed its S-4 for the Iridium takeover, backed by a $3.6B bridge loan.

Northrop Grumman took a $158.8M Army contract modification tied to aircraft-survivability work at its Rolling Meadows, Illinois site.