Field of View (FOV) - February 2024

Approach Venture’s Field of View (or “FOV”) is a monthly newsletter providing space industry participants with key insights, trends, updates and analysis to stay informed. Field of View is produced alongside space industry experts, founders, startup operators as well as commercial and government decision makers.

Approach Venture was formed to enable founding teams building the future of frontier technology to achieve their full potential. Today, Approach supports space companies ranging from stealth to publicly-traded as well as investors looking to participate in their growth potential. Connect with Approach to learn more.

This month’s Field of View is presented by GJL Partners.

GJL Partners is a boutique accounting, finance, and tax recruiting firm specializing in the Southern California region. The group’s market verticals cover industries such as financial services, manufacturing, aerospace and defense, real estate, and consumer goods.

As a small firm, recruiting engagements are managed directly with the owner, Garrett Lash. GJL’s unique selling point includes customized mapping & sourcing for each role, in-depth candidate screening, and comprehensive offer and process management. Feel free to check out their website or send a direct email inquiry.

Emerging Trends

As access to space increases and launch costs decrease, space companies are entering the market with missions and product roadmaps catered towards their visions of the ideal buildout of in-space infrastructure. Below contains this month’s emerging trends to keep an eye on as the space economy evolves.

Point-to-Point Cargo Delivery.

Today, the ability to rapidly access any global region is increasingly important to the US military and its allies as regional conflicts escalate, multi-domain forces mobilize, and as the US expands routine OCONUS military exercises and operations.

Current cargo delivery service via aircraft can take up to 36 hours or longer; for emergency or rapid response scenarios like search and rescue operations, humanitarian assistance/disaster relief, counterterrorism operations, medical evaluations, and similar scenarios, increased responsiveness can help save lives and promote US strategic interests and likelihood of mission success.

Previously mentioned in our November 2023 newsletter, point-to-point cargo delivery continues to surface during DoD discussions as the need for solutions to solve contested logistics problems increases. This includes both space-to-space and space-to-Earth capabilities. We expect to see a number of DoD solicitations rolling out near term that call out point-to-point, specifically.

Extending Cloud Services into Space.

Off-planet commercialization will only realize its tremendous potential with the extension of cloud services into Space. Whether its Artificial Intelligence, deep data fusion, R&D analytics or spacecraft operations, it will be necessary to address the latency, security and cost requirements of the end user. Bringing Space-sourced data back to Earth for analysis creates a mission success barrier as today significant volumes of Space-sourced data are never analyzed due to its limited relevance shelf-life.

Scalable, space-hardened multi-cloud services in Space will address the need to convert data to information at the speed of relevance. The intersection of cloud and space will enable applications to be developed and tested in a terrestrial cloud environment, then seamlessly moved to a Space-based cloud region. As on Earth, cloud capabilities in Space will become critical infrastructure that will be increasingly depended upon by humans in LEO, the lunar region and beyond.

Rideshare Opportunities to Orbit

As many new space companies embark on vehicle demonstration missions, hosted and deployed payload opportunities arise. Below contains rideshare opportunities which might help your Company achieve flight heritage for a lower price point.

H2 2025 LEO to LLO Opportunity.

• Orbital Regime: LEO to LLO

• Target Launch Window: H2 2025

• Payload Type(s): Hosted (up to 30 kg) and Deployed (up to 60 kg ranging from 1U-16U form factors)

• Spacecraft Size: ESPA-Class

• Spacecraft Type: Transport Vehicle

• Transport Provider: Undisclosed

• Launch Provider: SpaceX

Large 2026 LEO Opportunity.

• Orbital Regime: LEO

• Target Launch Window: 2026

• High Level Mission CONOPS: 300-400 km drop off; flexible inclination

• Payload Type(s): 3,000 kg minimum - 4,000 kg maximum

• Spacecraft Type: Transport Vehicle

• Transport Provider: Undisclosed

• Launch Provider: SpaceX

Connect with Approach to learn more and meet your potential rideshare partner.

Stealth Spotlight 🔦

With more mass to orbit at a lower cost, new mission profiles and capabilities are emerging. At the heart of Stealth Company’s mission lies a large spacecraft roadmap, crafted for the challenges of deep space missions. Already partnered with the most experienced organizations in space, Stealth Company is building next-generation, high-power spacecraft to unlock unique mission sets including power supply services and in-space resource utilization (ISRU).

Headquartered in Long Beach, Stealth Company is currently raising a Seed round and plans to emerge their mission and partnership details from 'stealth mode' in the coming months.

Potential investors, Connect with Approach to learn more and meet the founding team.

Space Sector Trading Comps

Brought to you by one of the space industry’s leading investment banking teams located in New York City, Deutsche Bank.

Regulatory Rundown

Our rapid-growth space economy is gaining more visibility across the globe. Regulatory Rundown covers select space policies, evolving legislation updates, licensing requirements and top stories involving regulatory bodies.

Our September, October and November 2023 FOV newsletters chronicled in-space manufacturing startup Varda Space Industries’ pursuit of a re-entry license under the Federal Aviation Administration’s new Part 450 regulations, a procedural hurdle that delayed the return of their experimental W-Series 1 spacecraft from orbit by several months. Part 450 regulations were written with the intention of streamlining the launch and reentry licensing process, but Varda and other teams have experienced some turbulence in navigating the revised framework.

At long last, the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transport finally authorized Varda to conduct re-entry operations and on Wednesday February 21st (254 days after reaching orbit), Varda’s capsule landed softly in the Utah Test and Training Range (UTTR). This event is a major milestone on the path to commercializing Varda’s novel pharmaceutical processing technology in microgravity, but it is also a landmark for the federal government, which for the first time licensed a commercial entity to land a spacecraft on US soil.

The Federal Communications Commission, which regulates the use of spectrum, has identified in-space servicing, assembly and manufacturing (ISAM) activities as “an area of rapidly accelerating innovation and economic opportunity,” and is taking steps to add a new section its Part 25 rules that would better support their development. The FCC’s five commissioners voted unanimously on February 15th to propose a new framework for licensing ISAM space stations.

Industry comments on the proposal indicated that ISAM frequency use “will need to be agile,” as such activities must adapt to transmit to and receive from client satellites, as well as to avoid interfering with other satellites in geosynchronous (GSO) orbit, as an ISAM station may transit in close proximity to the GSO arc.

Determining how spectrum will be regulated for ISAM activities ahead of their deployment on orbit en masse sends a strong signal that continued investment, research and development is worthwhile. Estimates suggest that over 100 companies have undertaken ISAM projects (or research), that 18 of those have demonstrated some degree of operational ISAM capabilities, and another 40 claim to be ready by 2029.

This month’s Field of View is presented by Aero X Ventures.

Aero X Ventures (or AXV) is an early-stage venture firm investing in innovative technologies that are transforming Aerospace and Defense.

AXV specializes in leading Seed and Series A investments within the United States and is focused on companies with product traction in Advanced Air Mobility (AAM), Robotics & Autonomous Systems (RAS), & Smart Manufacturing.

Connect with Approach for a warm introduction.

Force Multiplier

A commonly referenced term within the DoD, a force multiplier is a tool, strategy or person that, when added to or employed by a team, significantly increases mission success and team potential. Each month, you’ll find select force multipliers enabling space companies to level up as they look to scale.

BAE Systems Completes Acquisition of Ball Aerospace.

Originally mentioned in our August 2023 newsletter, BAE Systems’ $5.5 Billion purchase price of Ball Aerospace adds 5,200 employees to their roster and creates a new business segment at the Company called Space & Mission Systems (SMS).

Ball Aerospace builds spacecraft, instruments and sensors for DoD and NASA satellites that are used to track space objects and monitor weather and climate change.

Impulse Strengthens DoD Presence.

In July 2023, Impulse Space closed a $45mm Series A round led by RTX Ventures (Raytheon Technologies’ CVC arm). Since then, Impulse has hired several senior team members with new space experience to ramp their commercial business development pipeline (see our November FOV newsletter where Josh Rea is mentioned who joined from Dawn Aerospace) and now, Government Relations. Margaret Abernathy joins Impulse following time in legal and government relations roles at SpaceX as well as Phase Four and is a current Supervisory Board Member at Mynaric (NASDAQ: MYNA).

Additionally, Impulse added former US Space Force General John “Jay” Raymond to their Board of Directors (BOD). Gen (RET) Raymond recently retired after 38 years of service was responsible for leading the establishment of the US Space Force and was the branches first guardian and Chief of Space Operations from 2019 to 2022.

Argo Onboards Principal Spacecraft Design Engineer.

Following time as Chief Engineer at Redwire Space and Made in Space, Dr. Daniel Hillsberry joins Argo Space Corp. as Principal Spacecraft Engineer.

Dan's experience leading the development of novel spacecraft and space programs will be invaluable to the development of Argo's own refuellable, high deltaV in-space transport vehicle.

Northwood Gains Head of Growth on the Heels of Fundraise.

Northwood emerged from stealth this month and announced a ~$6mm round led by Founders Fund with participation by Andreessen Horowitz, Also Capital and Long Journey.

Soon thereafter, Zachary Kirstein announced joining the team as Head of Growth following 6 years at Palantir as Portfolio Lead and most recently, Loft Federal in a Head of Strategy & BD role. Zachary joined Loft Federal around the same time the Company announced a partnership with Ball Aerospace and Microsoft in support of the Space Development Agency’s NExT program.

Northwood is focused on building satellite ground stations designed with fast production and deployment flexibility to resolve a bottleneck the Company sees in shared ground stations resulting in customer difficulty to ID availability on existing teleports.

Tracked Opportunities

Approach Venture is tracking many active federal solicitations for funding space and defense capabilities. Below is an illustrative list of opportunities on our radar that you should also be tracking.

• NASA released their Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences 2024 (ROSES-2024) call soliciting basic and applied science research and technology development

• Director’s Innovation Initiative (DII) invests across the US in frontier technologies and high payoff concepts relevant to the NRO’s missions for national security. This annual program releases announcements and requests in search of innovative ideas that support NRO. DII is accepting proposals from March 11 - May 13, 2024

  • Areas of interest include but are not limited to: apertures, communications, remote sensing, satellite system design and sense-making

• DoD SBIR 2024.1, 2024.A, and 2024.D specific topics are open to fund the maturation of critical technologies for defense agencies including the USAF, USSF, MDA, SOCOM, and Navy

• AFWERX Open Topic SBIR/STTR Phase I closes next week. These Phase Is solicit technology solutions that solve a defined Air Force use case

• See additional Tracked Opportunities covered in last month’s FOV newsletter

To identify and receive proposal support for opportunities tied to advancing your respective roadmap, Connect with Approach.

Founder Tip

Supply chain, strategic sourcing and procurement are often seen as less important than sales and marketing efforts in early-stage startups; to be fair, these specialties are cost centers, can be perceived as a distraction from engineering, and interfacing with suppliers can consume valuable time and energy. But unless a company is truly 100% vertically integrated, developing relationships with suppliers is a reality of most frontier technology businesses and should be properly managed by an expert.

Forging early relationships with strong suppliers can make the difference between a build and test schedule proceeding as planned, or extended and costly delays (resulting in customer and investor impatience). Identifying the right mix of suppliers with conducive capabilities, order backlogs, pricing and payment terms can all be contributing factors to receiving hardware error-free and on time.

Some suppliers can even provide expert-level DFM (Design For Manufacturing) advice to enable shorter cycle times (and therefore lower cost), advise on material selection and availability and even the optimal manufacturing resources required for prototyping and production volumes. As such, supplier relationships should be viewed as partnerships rather than adversarial—and managing them should not be treated as an afterthought, but rather as an opportunity.

Connect with Approach for supply chain support and best practices.

Did You Know?

Hadrian, an automated CNC-machining provider headquartered in Torrance, recently closed a $117mm Series B fundraise with RTX Ventures as a participant?