← T-Minus: Space-Cyber Briefing
T-Minus: Space-Cyber Briefing
AI trained in space.
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Starcloud has successfully trained and run the first large AI model in space. BAE selected by DARPA to advance autonomous space-based surveillance. And more.
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You're listening to the N2K space network.
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AI is transforming every industry, but it's also creating new risks that traditional frameworks can't keep up with. Assessments today are fragmented, overlapping, and often specific to industries, geographies or regulations. That's why Black kite created the BKGA3AI assessment framework to give cybersecurity and risk teams a unified, evolving standard for measuring AI risk across their own organizations and their vendors. AI use it's global, research driven, built to evolve with the threat landscape, and free to use because Black Kite is committed to strengthening the entire cybersecurity community. Learn more@blackkite.com.
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Today is December 11th, 2025. I'm Maria Varmazas and this is T minus T minus 20 seconds. The European Space Agency, viasat and Boeing have been testing space based technology with new aviation standards from and to the United States and Europe. 4 Hawkeye 360 has announced a multi year contract valued at more than $100 million with an unnamed international partner. Firefly Aerospace will host Volta Space Technologies wireless power receiver on Firefly's Blue Ghost Mission two lander on the far side of the moon soon. Darpa has awarded BAE a phase two contract to advance autonomous space based surveillance StarCloud has successfully trained and run the first large AI model in space. And our guest today is Jerome Hittle, CEO and Founder at Amplified Space. We're going to be discussing software defined power systems and learning more about all of their upcoming missions after today's headlines, so stick around to find out more. Happy Thursday everybody. Thank you for joining me today. It's been the race to Space within the Race to Space in the commercial industry right now. What am I talking about? Orbital data centers of course. And Star Cloud, a Washington based startup backed by Nvidia, has successfully trained and run the first large AI model in space aboard its StarCloud One satellite equipped with a powerful Nvidia H100 GPU. And this GPU is reportedly 100 times more capable than any chip previously sent into orbit. And and it's now running models like Google's Gemma and even training nanogpt with Shakespeare's works of all things, all far above the planet's surface. So why do any of this in space at all? Well, the answer to this lies in scale and sustainability and it's why space based orbital data centers are so hot right now. Traditional data centers on Earth consume massive amounts of power and water, straining local energy grids and creating environmental concerns. To pull it mildly, starcloud's vision is to move this energy hungry computing all into orbit where continuous solar power and natural cooling in the vacuum of space could dramatically reduce costs and environmental impact. And they're even planning gigawatt scale orbital data centers that might one day rival terrestrial server farms. And we do predict that orbital data centers are going to be the biggest trend of 2026. Not a stretch there at all still, and congratulations to Starcloud for being the first with their large AI model. We gotta wonder who's next. The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, better known to most of us as DARPA, has awarded BAE Systems Fast Labs Research Development and Production Organization a $16 million phase two contract for the oversight program. And the oversight program you might be asking, is focused on creating an autonomous system that keeps track or maintains constant custody of a large number of terrestrial assets via new satellite constellations. And this contract is a follow on from Phase one, during which BAE Systems software was integrated into a modeling and simulation environment to demonstrate a custody mission on representative satellite and sensor models. In Phase two, BAE Systems plans to mature its solution algorithms and demonstrate operation with with increasingly larger constellations, more complex scenarios and higher fidelity modeling and simulation environments. The technology will eventually be physically deployed to both tactical edge satellites and ground stations. Firefly Aerospace will host Volta Space Technologies wireless power receiver on Firefly's Blue Ghost Mission 2 Lander that'll go to the far side of the moon. The payload will serve as a technology demonstration for Volta's planned lunar power network called light grid qualification. Testing for the fully stacked Blue Ghost and Elytra spacecraft structure is well underway for blue Ghost Mission 2. The team has also begun assembling flight hardware and has accepted and tested a majority of the payloads at Firefly's spacecraft facility. If you can believe it, the second Blue Ghost mission is expected to launch in late 2026 and I for one cannot wait and Hawkeye 360 has announced a multi year contract valued at more than $100 million with with an unnamed international partner. Under the five year agreement with this unnamed partner, aforementioned partner will receive access to Hawkeye's advanced radio frequency data and analytics with options to scale collection capacity and integrate regional ground infrastructure. The agreement is designed to enhance mission delivery and strengthen tactical operational support across key client mission domains. And as part of the agreement, Hawkeye will deploy dedicated satellite clusters with full operational capability in early 2027. And here is another example of how space based technology is improving life for us here on Earth. The European Space agency satellite operator ViaSat and aerospace company Boeing have been testing space based technology with new aviation standards from and to the United States and Europe. Boeing aircraft have been using the IRIS satellite based system to digitally connect pilots via satel with air traffic controllers, enabling the more efficient routing of flights and reducing the fuel consumed. The IRIS service and communications System, developed by ViaSat in partnership with ESA, with ESSP as service provider and a wide industrial consortium of European and Canadian companies, has been fully operational in European aerospace since 2024 with more than 17,000 flights so far and counting. So this partnership with Boeing paves the way to make IRIS more global. So the next time your flight lands a little earlier than the schedule said, you might want to thank a satellite system for making it so. And that, my friends, wraps up today's intel briefing. But if you want to read more about space based technology in aviation or any of the other stories that were mentioned in today's episode, then head on over to the links in the selected Reading section of the show. Notes and speaking of N2K, senior producer Alice Carruth joins us now with a look at the other stories that we have included in there today for you. Alice, what are you looking at? Hey Maria. Momentous has been selected to participate in the Missile Defense Agency's Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layer Defense or SHIELD Indefinite Delivery, Indefinite Quantity Contract Vehicle. This designation positions Momentous to compete for rapid task orders, supporting technology demonstrations, missile tracking, resilient communications and other national defense missions. And adding to today's top story, we've included a Wall Street Journal article on the race to bring data centers to space. It really is the hottest thing in the industry right now. IT crew if you are going to be at Space Week in Orlando coming up in late January and that includes the Global Spaceport Alliance's annual summit, Space Mobility and spacecom. We will be there also. So if you would like to speak with us during the event, we have a microphone and we do travel, drop us a line@space2k.com so we can set something up. And thanks.
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Our guest today is Jerome Hittel, CEO and founder at Amplified Space. Jerome started off by telling me more about his background.
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Well, I started my career back in high school working at Johnson Space center, scanning in pictures of the moon rocks as they were going from paper systems to digital systems. And as you know, that just was the first door of many doors that opened, Right. And I ended up working on four deep spacecraft. One is a technician, and then three as an engineer. And so I was able to develop power systems that are actually on the surface of Mars and orbiting Jupiter. And so that's really where I kind of got my start. But I really got bored of what the old space. And it takes forever to develop this. And so I left space for a while, worked in Internet of Things, developing LED lighting systems for commercial applications, and then also worked with a company that was doing integrated circuits to be able to electrify vehicles. And so I've always had, like, this, let's change humanity sort of background in everything I do.
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So, wow. I was going to say, just what you got bored of would for many people be kind of the pinnacle of their career. You're kind of like, yeah, my stuff's on a bunch of other planets, it's fine. And I got bored of that. Okay. But that's awesome because that ambition and that fire in the belly, so to speak, that is a great thing for an entrepreneur to have. And getting bored and being like, I want to do something way, like, I want to build on that. That's how great things are made. And that's what you're working on right now, right?
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Yeah, we're working on. You know, I took the experience from all three of those disciplines and said, how can I build a company around this? You know, I've got the aerospace background. I've learned about digital control systems at the LED lighting company. And I've also learned about how this new GAN transistor technology is coming about in the integrated circuit community. And I thought, well, how do I pull all these technologies together? And that's where I met Jamie, our chief operating officer. And I said, jamie, what do I do with this? At the time, she was working with a small business development center out of Boulder, and she said, you have to put in an application to NASA for this. And I said, okay. And so I did and won the very first SBIR proposal I ever put out. And you know, as they say, the rest is history.
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All right, so that brings us to amplified space then. So, yes, please give me the pitch. Tell me about it.
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So we developed software configurable power systems for spacecraft. We have a single piece of hardware that we can program with software to be able to connect this to your batteries, your solar arrays, your power supplies, your propulsion system, your motor, your reaction wheels, your flight computer, the list goes on. But we're able to scale because it's a single piece of hardware that we can connect to all of those things. And so we're able to rapidly produce and have our customers kind of software configure it to whatever they want to want it to be in their application.
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Can you paint a picture for me of sort of what you all are doing is disrupting something? Right. So what did it look like before? Like what is the thing that you all are sort of fixing?
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Yeah. So if you were to go to one of our competitors, they'd say, oh, you need this solar ray card, you need this battery card, you need this power supply card, you need the switch card, you know, and there's all these different components and stuff. And your engineers have to understand exactly how each one of those work. And there's risks there because there's software that's different on every one of them. And we have a very a software that is 70% unified between each one of our applications because our hardware never changes. And so we're able to really disrupt what everybody else is doing in a couple of different ways.
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That's awesome. So you're streamlining and also reducing complexity, which is always the goal for a better, more efficient system, I would imagine. So tell me about those.
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Yeah, so we've delivered this year for three flights. One was with a company called Hex20 out of India that we've been doing a lot of work with and they're developing their own bus. We're really excited to see where they're going to. Our second flight is with Portal Space Systems where we're doing an on orbit demonstration on their mini Nova platform. They've got several of these in their spacecraft and they're flying it in Q1 next year. And then our third opportunity is with the International Space Station. We're working with Aegis Aerospace and with the International Space Station to deliver this and it'll be on its Missy platform and we're actually wrapping that up today. As a matter of fact.
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Oh my gosh.
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So, yeah, and so they fly out on Thursday and then they're flying and integrating on Friday and everything's going really well there and stuff. But we have three flights next year and, you know, for a company our size with only 10 people or so, you know, that's really an accomplishment and I'm really proud of what our team's done this year.
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It absolutely, it is. That's incredible. Three flights with a team of 10 people. And yes, as you mentioned, I've spoken to Jeff at Portal a couple times and you know, their stuff is very, very cool. So that you're working with them is to me a hugely validating thing for the incredible thing that you all are also building. Because I know Jeff is very visionary and he knows good stuff when he sees it. So that's so great. I'm super happy for you all. That's awesome.
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I mean, I'll just tell you a little quick antidote story between me and Jeff. I don't know if it'll make the final cut, but Jeff and I, the first time we talked to each other, it was like, what are you doing? He's like, we're doing this. I said, well, we're doing this. And we're both like, you just see the fireworks going. Like, we see how disruptive each one of us is and like how it's just going to change how everybody does it in the future. And, you know, it was just super fireworks. I love what they're doing. I'm always looking for customers, especially that. And really partners, not so much customers, but partners that are really disrupting things. Because I know that we can go far with them and they can go far with us. And so we're always looking for those sorts of capabilities in who we work with.
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That's awesome. Yeah. And truly the three missions you have coming up, those are all extremely exciting. And the fact that you're wrapping one up right now, I'm extraordinarily appreciative that you took some time to talk to me with all that going on because I imagine you all are crazy busy, so I won't waste your time. But I'm dying to know about your long term vision for amplified space, like what success looks like for you all, what you're looking towards in the long term future.
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You know, I want to disrupt the industry. I want to be part of what that looks like. I want to have our families going to space in the long term. Right. The technology we develop here is part of that. Story. It's not the complete story, of course, but it is part of that story. And I think the whole industry has to kind of come together so that we can continue to build that right? And we're always looking for partners, partners to kind of get to that next level too. And you know, all those partners, like, it's an interesting array and matrix of all these different companies doing all these different things. But you know that that old analogy of the rising tide lifts all ships is certainly true in this industry.
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We'll be right back. The Uniswap wallet makes crypto easier and safer to own and use, discover new tokens, research confidently swap instantly, and manage it all securely in one place. The Uniswap trading protocol has powered over $3 trillion in volume and it's trusted by millions worldwide. Buy your first crypto assets in a few taps and experience the freedom of decentralized finance with Uniswap. Tap the banner to get started. Welcome back. There's a bit of a Martian mystery going on with NASA's MAVEN mission at the moment. The Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution or Maven orbiter around, you guessed it, Mars recently celebrated 10 successful years on the job. But NASA reports just a few days ago, on December 6, after orbiting behind Mars, Maven then stopped communications with the home base and just has not re established sending telemetry as expected. And I should note before all this happened, Maven was working just nominally. So this is all a bit sudden and unexpected. Right now NASA teams are investigating the root cause and hoping to re establish a signal from Maven as because Maven is the way that the Mars rovers signals are relayed from the Martian surface back to Earth also. So we kind of need it up and running. Hope Maven's just having a temporary loss of voice as I have been struggling with lately and we'll be on the mend soon. And that's T minus. Brought to you by N2K CyberWire we'd love to know what you think of this podcast. Your feedback ensures we deliver the insights that keep you a step ahead in the rapidly changing space industry. If you like our show, please share a rating and review in your podcast app. Please also fill out the survey in the show notes or send an email. The space2k.com we are proud that N2K CyberWire is part of the daily routine of the most influential leaders and operators in the public and private sector. From the Fortune 500 to many of the world's preeminent intelligence and law enforcement agencies, N2K helps space and cybersecurity professionals grow, learn and stay informed. As the nexus for discovery and connection, we bring you the people, the technology and the ideas shaping the future of secure innovation. Learn how@n2k.com N2K Senior Producer is Alice Carruth. Our producer is Liz Stokes. We are mixed by Elliot Peltzman and Trey Hester with original music by Elliot Peltzman. Our Executive producer is Jennifer Ibin. Peter Kilpe is our publisher and I am your host, Maria Varmazes. Thank you for listening. We'll see you tomorrow. T minus. Hey Ryan Reynolds here wishing you a.
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Very happy half off holiday because right.
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