Today, the government takes 10 years to direct the design and build a satellite to replace one doing the exact same mission.Įach of these next generation space companies will not allow the Pentagon or Congress to design their products and services. How we lost the ability to safely deliver a manned mission to the moon from a standstill in seven years is no mystery. As Elon Musk likes to say so often, “if the schedule is long, the design is wrong.” Real competitions done in weeks instead of years. So, what can Congress do? The solution is more of what SDA is doing: smaller fixed priced delivery of capability on orbit in two years instead of ten. Soon, the current major Space Force programs will begin the now all too predictable formal notifications to Congress of more multi-year delays and cost overruns. These timelines might not be fast enough for the Chairman, but there is no other space agency of the federal government with speed on its mind.
We all hope so, especially as the SDA eventually transitions into the Space Force. The agency’s speedy approach can easily withstand the scrutiny of the GAO, too, but everyone from the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs down to the newest Space Force officers at SSC now believes we can go faster.
The SDA openly competes contracts, even ones that handle the highest classified information, in a matter of months.
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