Jason Rainbow

TAMPA, Fla. — The Federal Communications Commission is set to vote July 22 on an order to overhaul its satellite application process, creating a “licensing assembly line” to keep up with increasingly large and complex constellation plans.

TAMPA, Fla. — Verde Technologies is turning to space to commercialize perovskite-based solar panels, shifting its initial focus away from rooftops in a bet that the thin-film material can help power orbital data centers and other large constellations.

TAMPA, Fla. — Iridium Communications has completed its takeover of Aireon, bringing the aircraft-tracking venture fully in-house ahead of the satellite operator's planned $8 billion sale to Rocket Lab.

TAMPA, Fla. — Belgium's Simera Sense has won a contract to provide multispectral imagers for a small constellation being designed to track wildfires, volcanic activity and other regional priorities for the Canary Islands off the coast of Spain.

TAMPA, Fla. — Apolink has made contact with its first satellite after launching on SpaceX's July 7 rideshare mission, clearing the way for a data relay demonstration using a novel experimental license from the Federal Communications Commission.

TAMPA, Fla. — Pet technology company Fi launched a dog tracker July 8 that uses T-Mobile's Starlink-enabled T-Satellite service to remain connected across the United States, even outside the telco's terrestrial network.

For the growing number of constellations being designed around Starship, the wild ups and downs in the early days of SpaceX's historic IPO have a familiar rhythm.

Environmental and scientific groups are calling for a halt to processing orbital data center applications, arguing the rush to move computing infrastructure into space has raised the stakes in a broader push for more megaconstellation oversight.

Space is hard, as the decades-old adage goes. For much of the industry's history, “rocket science” was as much a barrier to entry as a byword for difficulty.

TAMPA, Fla. — European government space spending jumped 12% to 13.5 billion euros ($15.4 billion) in 2025, according to a July 13 European Space Agency report, bucking a 3% global decline on the back of rising national defense budgets.