Q2 2026 showed the space and satellite sector moving further into an infrastructure phase. The quarter’s most notable developments were not standalone launches, contract awards, or company announcements, but signs of broader convergence around regulatory execution, spectrum strategy, government procurement, operational resilience, and capital discipline as commercial space systems become more embedded in terrestrial connectivity, civil agency missions, national security architectures, Earth observation, and orbital safety.
The clearest regulatory signal came from satellite-enabled connectivity. The Federal Communications Commission advanced actions involving supplemental coverage from space, direct-to-device spectrum strategy, and satellite broadband coordination, indicating that satellite-terrestrial convergence is increasingly driven by licensing conditions, spectrum rights, interference management, deployment milestones, and coordination obligations.
Government demand continued to shape commercial space markets. NASA expanded commercial satellite data acquisition and continued to support commercial low Earth orbit and exploration models, while Space Systems Command issued major awards tied to protected communications, space-based sensing, and proliferated LEO data transport. Commercial markets remain closely tied to appropriations, tasking, OTA and IDIQ structures, cybersecurity, data rights, interoperability, mission assurance, and customer concentration.
Operational governance also moved closer to the center of commercial planning. Commerce’s TraCSS onboarding, responsive launch and rendezvous/proximity operations demonstrations, and continued focus on SSA/SDA indicate that orbital congestion, safety data, and risk allocation are increasingly relevant to operators, insurers, lenders, and counterparties. The result is a more mature but more complex operating environment requiring earlier alignment on regulatory approvals, spectrum and data rights, procurement pathways, financing structures, operational-risk controls, and cross-border compliance.
I. Regulation & Policy
FCC Actions Move Satellite-Cellular Convergence Into Licensing & Spectrum Phase
The FCC took several Q2 actions that materially advanced the regulatory framework for satellite-enabled connectivity. On April 21, the FCC Space Bureau authorized AST SpaceMobile, subject to conditions, to deploy and operate a 248-satellite NGSO constellation for supplemental coverage from space in the United States and direct-to-cell services outside the United States. On May 12, the FCC approved SpaceX/EchoStar spectrum assignment applications involving approximately 65 MHz of mid-band spectrum tied to a next-generation direct-to-device network. On May 13, the Federal Register published the FCC's satellite broadband spectrum-sharing order extending good-faith coordination obligations between NGSO and GSO fixed-satellite service operators and adopting technical backstops. These actions collectively reflect that satellite-cellular convergence is becoming a licensing, spectrum, and compliance matter.
Defense Space Procurement Continues to Favor Commercially Integrated Architectures
Space Systems Command issued several Q2 awards and program updates signaling continued demand for protected communications, proliferated LEO architectures, space-based sensing, and optical data transport. SSC awarded Viasat and Intelsat General Communications two firm-fixed-price Protected Tactical SATCOM-Global contracts totaling $437.7 million for Swarm 1 satellites; awarded SpaceX a $4.16 billion OTA agreement for Space-Based Airborne Moving Target Indicator; and awarded SpaceX a $2.29 billion OTA delivery order for the Space Data Network Backbone, a proliferated LEO optically interconnected data-transport layer with prototype capability due by end of 2027. Separately, the House Armed Services Committee's FY27 NDAA chairman's mark identified commercial space, commercial remote sensing, CASR, and space data network issues as areas for congressional attention. The awards reinforce the relevance of commercial participation in national-security space and highlight the legal and operational complexity of defense-space work.
NASA Commercial Data Signals Keep Procurement Structure & Data Rights in Focus
NASA continued to use commercial mechanisms to support civil-space and Earth-observation needs. On June 18, NASA added eight companies and new data products from six existing contract holders to its Commercial Satellite Data Acquisition program under an IDIQ structure with an original maximum value of $476 million. NASA's FY 2027 budget request summary also identified $300 million for Commercial LEO Development, continued ISS/deorbit investments, and emphasis on commercial LEO destinations and Moon-to-Mars architecture.
TraCSS Onboarding Ushers Space Traffic Coordination to Operational Governance
On June 9, the Department of Commerce Office of Space Commerce announced it had begun onboarding National Government Accounts into TraCSS, supplementing the satellite owner/operator pilot for space situational awareness and spaceflight safety services. TraCSS remains in pilot and evaluation phases, but its expansion may affect how operators, SSA/SDA vendors, insurers, civil agencies, and allied governments approach safety data, account access, service expectations, space traffic coordination, and liability allocation. As constellations grow and proximity operations become more common, spaceflight safety data and operational coordination may become more relevant in diligence, contracting, insurance, and compliance planning.
EU Secure-Connectivity Activity Adds a Selective Allied-Market Signal
The European Commission advanced secure-connectivity activity through both infrastructure and industrial policy measures. On May 28, the Commission opened a EUR 20 million grant call for IRIS2/GOVSATCOM user terminal industrialization focused on Ka-band terminal readiness, supply-chain resilience, and 5G NR NTN migration. On June 25, the Commission reported groundbreaking for a permanent GOVSATCOM hub site in Cologne and described GOVSATCOM as operational since January 2026 with interim hub services. These developments may affect market access, terminal supply chains, partnership strategy, secure communications procurement, strategic-autonomy requirements, and eligibility for EU grant or procurement opportunities.
II. Space & Satellite Insights
Rocket Lab-Iridium Transaction Highlights Spectrum, Subscribers & Integrated Infrastructure
On June 29, Rocket Lab announced a definitive agreement to acquire Iridium in a transaction valuing Iridium at approximately $8 billion enterprise value. The announcement described a combination of Rocket Lab's launch and manufacturing capabilities with Iridium's L-band network, subscriber base, spectrum position, and satellite applications. The transaction is a notable vertical-integration signal for the satellite and space infrastructure market, but it remains subject to shareholder approval, regulatory approvals, financing, and closing conditions.
NASA Commercial Exploration & Servicing Developments Raise Risk-Allocation Issues
NASA advanced several commercial partnership models in Q2. On June 17, NASA announced a public-private partnership with Relativity Space under a reimbursable Space Act Agreement for the planned Aeolus Mars atmospheric science mission. On June 11, NASA discussed Katalyst Space Technologies' LINK mission to rendezvous with and boost NASA's Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory. On June 9, NASA announced Artemis III details involving Earth-orbit rendezvous and docking demonstrations with Blue Origin and SpaceX commercial human landing system test articles. Commercial providers are taking on more mission-critical roles in civil-space programs.
Responsive Launch & RPO Reinforce Commercial Operators National-Security Role
On June 22, Space Systems Command announced that the U.S. Space Force had demonstrated responsive launch for the VICTUS HAZE mission and begun on-orbit operations. SSC reported that Rocket Lab launched the mission on Electron after activation within 48 hours of notice-to-launch, and that a companion True Anomaly Jackal vehicle had launched earlier on May 3. Responsive launch and rendezvous/proximity operations may affect future defense procurement, launch licensing, operational safety, export controls, mission-assurance obligations, insurance and liability allocation, and commercial participation in SDA/SSA and tactically responsive space.
GT Insights
Published Article
Foundation for the Moon: Legal Stability and the Future of Lunar Operations
Author: Milton “Skip” Smith
The next era of lunar activity will require more than rockets and robotics. It will require confidence.
As governments and commercial companies prepare for sustained operations on the Moon, legal stability is emerging as one of the most important foundations for long-term investment. Infrastructure, resource extraction, communications systems, and surface operations all depend on a framework that gives operators confidence they can safely build, operate, and grow.
GT Alert
EU Commission Proposes New Authorization Regime for Mobile Satellite Services
Authors: Dr. Christoph Enaux and Dr. Lucas Wüsthof
The European Commission plans to allocate the 2 GHz satellite band through a single EU-wide selection procedure once existing rights expire in 2027. The proposed regulation aims to reserve one-third of the spectrum for governmental, security, and defense use while two-thirds would be dedicated to commercial use.
Published Article
In the Heavens as It Is on Earth: Embracing Federalism to Supervise and Promote U.S. Non-Governmental Entities’ Non-National Activities in Outer Space
Author: Steven Bartz
The article examines how space law’s state‑centric origins strain under the rapid growth of U.S. commercial space activity and proposes federalism as a solution. As commercial space activities expand exponentially in frequency, complexity, and economic significance, the U.S. faces both a compliance challenge (i.e., keeping its Outer Space Treaty Article VI implementation current) and a strategic challenge (i.e., avoiding being locked into less liberty‑protective foreign interpretations of its treaty obligations). The article argues that the U.S. should leverage its constitutional structure to address these challenges: U.S. federal law would continue to implement obligations with more directly international and interstate implications (including launch licensing, remote sensing, spectrum, export controls, and national security), while the fifty respective U.S. states would provide the familiar, innovation‑driving ecosystem of private law (property, contract, corporate, and related doctrines) for NGEs’ non-national activities in outer space. By consciously extending American federalism beyond Earth’s surface—using states as “laboratories of democracy” for space private-law regimes while preserving federal control over more direct international and interstate responsibilities—the article argues that the U.S. can better satisfy its treaty obligations, unleash capital formation and commercial experimentation, and secure a durable competitive advantage in the new space race.
GT Alert
US Army FY 2027 Budget Request – Key Trends, Risks, and Implications
Authors: Misha Lehrer and Daniel Sennott
The U.S. Army’s FY 2027 budget request emphasizes force growth, modernization, and industrial base expansion. The Army is requesting approximately $252.8 billion, an increase over FY 2026 levels. Army leadership has characterized FY 2027 as a foundational year in a longer-term transformation effort.
The request proposes simultaneous investment in personnel growth, next-generation capabilities, munitions capacity, and readiness. It also incorporates a dual-track funding structure that combines discretionary appropriations with a proposed mandatory funding component. As with the Navy’s request, the Army’s FY 2027 proposal indicates areas of potential demand but remains subject to modification through the congressional authorization and appropriations process.
GT Alert
Japan Shifts to Next‑Generation Space Transportation Regulation with Space Activities Act Amendment
Authors: Junko Suetomi and Junya Okura
On March 27, 2026, the government of Japan approved a bill to amend the Act on Launching Spacecraft and Launch Vehicle and Control of Spacecraft (the Space Activities Act). The amendment would represent a shift from the previous “satellite‑centric” regulatory framework to a broader system covering what it calls “Next-Generation Transportation Services,” including rocket reuse, on‑orbit servicing, and return from space.1 For companies currently operating in, or considering entry into, the space sector, this development may reduce business risks and improve regulatory predictability.
GT Alert
Department of Commerce Proposes ‘Space Commerce Certification’ Process
Authors: Kathryne C. Dickerson and Dr. Michael C. Mineiro
The proposed Space Commerce Certification process is intended to interface with commercial space regulations and streamline agency review, and would: Be open to “novel space activities” not clearly regulated by existing federal regulatory frameworks and identified as eligible by the Office of Space Commerce (OSC); Be voluntary and opt-in; Involve a light-touch, interagency review focused on national security, foreign policy, international obligations, and space safety; and Operate on a presumption of Secretary of Commerce approval of a Space Commerce Certification, with decisions generally issued within 120 days. The Certification process would not replace existing Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), or Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Commercial Remote Sensing Regulatory Affairs (CRSRA) licensing obligations.
III. Industry Events
- SmallSat 2026: August 23-26, 2026 | Salt Lake City, UT. Relevant to constellation operators, manufacturers, launch providers, ground-infrastructure companies, investors, and SDA/defense stakeholders.
Lead Attorneys: Cara Cavanaugh, Kate Dickerson, John Huber, Dr. Michael Mineiro, Mark Rasich, Milton “Skip” Smith, Matt Squires
Event page
- World Space Business Week 2026: September 14-17, 2026 | Paris. Relevant to satellite operators, investors, manufacturers, Earth observation companies, defense/security stakeholders, and international business development teams.
Lead Attorney: Frank Lamancusa
Event page
- AMOS 2026: September 15-18, 2026 | Maui. Relevant to SSA/SDA vendors, satellite operators, insurers, defense contractors, and space-traffic stakeholders focused on orbital congestion, RPO, tracking, safety data, and operational norms.
Event page - Seattle Space Week: September 28-October 4, 2026 | Seattle, WA. Relevant for space industry leaders, founders, technologists, researchers, students, investors, and aerospace organizations.
Event Page
- IISL Space Law Conference: October 1, 2026 | London. Relevant for space industry professionals, government regulators, legal experts, policymakers, academics, and organizations involved in space operations and governance.
Lead Attorneys: Dr. Michael Mineiro and Milton “Skip” Smith
Event Page
- IAC 2026: October 5-9, 2026 | Antalya, Turkiye. A focused international forum for globally active companies and stakeholders seeking policy and agency engagement.
Lead Attorneys: Dr. Michael Mineiro and Milton “Skip” Smith
Event page