LONG BEACH, Calif. - Rocket Lab Corporation announced the launch window for its next mission for multi-launch customer Institute for Q-shu Pioneers of Space, Inc. (iQPS), a Japan-based Earth imaging company. The mission will be Electron’s 74th launch to date and 16th mission this year.

The upcoming dedicated launch, named ‘The Nation God Navigates', is scheduled to launch from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand during a launch window that opens on November 5, 2025 UTC. The mission will deploy QPS-SAR-14, nicknamed YACHIHOKO-I for the Japanese god of nation-building, to a 575km circular Earth orbit. This satellite will join the rest of the QPS-SAR constellation in providing high resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images and Earth monitoring services globally. iQPS aims to build a constellation of 36 SAR satellites that will provide near-real-time images of Earth every 10 minutes.

‘The Nation God Navigates’ will be the sixth mission deployed on Electron for iQPS, following previous successful missions ‘The Moon God Awakens’ in December 2023 as well as ‘The Lightning God Reigns’, ‘The Sea God Sees’ , ‘The Mountain God Guards’ and ‘The Harvest Goddess Thrives’ in 2025. Beyond this mission, six more dedicated iQPS missions are set to launch on Electron in 2026 and beyond, making Rocket Lab the go-to provider for their constellation.

Source: Rocket Lab
Associated URL: https://rocketlabcorp.com/updates/rocket-lab-schedules-next-electron-launch-sixth-mission-for-constellation-operator-iqps/

WESTMINSTER, Colo. - Vantor announced it will be supporting U.S. Space Force in tracking high-interest objects that pass through "blind spots" in space that are not visible to ground sensor networks.

Under the contract, which will support Space Force's Joint Commercial Operations program, Vantor will utilize its high-resolution imagery of space objects, also known as non-Earth imagery (NEI), to deliver key information about an object's position and trajectory. The crucial observations will allow Space Force to maintain persistent custody of the high-interest objects and will be particularly useful in situations where an object has the potential to change orbit--a situation that could endanger the safety of U.S. assets in space.

Position and trajectory measurements on objects in ground sensor "blind spots" can be delivered through the precise intelligence collected from NEI. Vantor satellites can capture images of other spacecraft at an industry-leading resolution of less than 10 cm from hundreds of kilometers away, making it possible to quickly characterize those space objects and determine their health and status.

This Space Force award is one of several Space Domain Awareness-related contracts that Vantor, previously known as Maxar Intelligence, has recently won.

Vantor is an awardee of The Office of Space Commerce's "Commercial COLA Gap" Pathfinder program. The COLA Gap refers to the period right after a satellite launch when space traffic coordination is hampered by limited or imprecise tracking data. During this time, newly deployed satellites may not have reliable positional information, creating a spike in collision risk and posing coordination challenges for satellite operators, launch providers, and traffic management authorities. Vantor's NEI and Space Domain Awareness insights will deliver visual-based intelligence to help minimize collision risk. Vantor was also included in Space Force's Domain Awareness Tools, Applications and Processing Lab's Apollo Accelerator Cohort 6. Vantor will support Space Force by automatically tasking high-resolution NEI to enable rapid response decision-making on threats in orbit.

Source: Vantor
Associated URL: https://vantor.com/blog/vantor-awarded-us-space-force-space-domain-awareness-contract-for-continuous-tracking-of-high-interest-space-objects/

CARLSBAD, Calif. - Viasat, Inc. announced successful tests of its steerable beam high-speed GX10 Arctic communications payload in Northern Canada. The demonstration flight, completed on a Calspan Gulfstream III aircraft, enabled attendees from Viasat’s government and military partners to connect their own devices over more than 600 miles of Arctic territory and showcased the satellites’ steerable Mil-Ka beam capabilities. The high-capacity GX10A and GX10B payloads are housed onboard Space Norway’s highly elliptical orbit (HEO) Arctic Satellite Broadband Mission (ASBM) spacecraft (ASBM-1 and ASBM-2). The satellites are operated using Space Norway’s secured earth ground stations in the north of Norway, while Viasat’s steerable beams and commercial payloads are controlled from its secure control center in the U.S. Part of the Communication Services segment and Viasat’s Government Satcom business, the GX10 capabilities strengthen Viasat’s global coverage capabilities with dedicated capacity for the Arctic region and support its roadmap of delivering multi-orbit services. Their onboard steerable Mil-Ka beams are designed to allow authorized military users to access our wideband capacity as part of their own independent network. This means governments will be able to steer satellite capacity anywhere within the arctic region above 63 degrees North: offering improved reliability and capacity for missions. Government Mil-Ka connectivity solutions enable mission applications across air, land, sea, and space, including supporting intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, border security, emergency response, and special forces operations.

Source: Viasat
Associated URL: https://www.viasat.com/news/latest-news/government/2025/viasat-government-arctic-canadian-test-flight/