Jeff Foust

WASHINGTON — An Ariane 6 with upgraded solid rocket boosters successfully launched three dozen Amazon Leo satellites June 17 as ESA weighs options for increasing the vehicle's launch rate.

WASHINGTON — Relativity Space plans to launch a Mars orbiter in 2028 as part of a new initiative to privately develop planetary missions.

WASHINGTON — Blue Origin has started rebuilding a launch pad severely damaged in a New Glenn explosion less than three weeks ago as it works to resume launches by the end of the year.

WASHINGTON — A high-risk mission to raise the orbit of a NASA astrophysics spacecraft is set to launch later this month after less than a year of development.

WASHINGTON — Private equity firm EQT is acquiring Exolaunch, a company that has handled the rideshare launches of hundreds of satellites, to help it meet growing launch demand.

WASHINGTON — A startup has acquired an aircraft to offer commercial parabolic flight services even as NASA seeks to acquire its own aircraft for reduced-gravity research.

WASHINGTON — NASA has selected for development a space science mission that will study how space weather interacts with Earth's atmosphere.

MDA Space is buying smallsat manufacturer Blue Canyon Technologies (BCT) for $620 million, giving it greater access to the U.S. government market.

PITTSBURGH — Lunar lander developer Astrobotic decided to sell to Voyager Technologies so it could quickly scale up to meet the projected demands of NASA's lunar base initiative.

WASHINGTON — Satellite servicing company Astroscale is working to transition from technology demonstrations to a regular series of missions, bolstered by a recent capital infusion.