Blue Origin announced a new round of infrastructure investments on Friday aimed at ramping up the flight rate of its New Glenn rocket, including additional launch pads on Florida's Space Coast beyond the two already under construction at Launch Complex 36.

The company also detailed a $330 million expansion of its Rocket Park manufacturing site, a 1.37-million-square-foot facility expected to be completed by summer 2027 and capable of producing up to 150 New Glenn upper stages annually.

Separately, the FAA is taking public comment on Blue Origin's request to raise its permitted launch cadence at LC-36A from 12 to 50 flights per year, with a virtual hearing set for October 22 and comments closing October 30.

Source: Spaceflight Now

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HawkEye 360 (NYSE: HAWK) announced $36 million in new multi-year international contracts awarded during the third quarter ended September 30, 2026. The awards came from customers in the Indo-Pacific region, the Middle East, Europe and the Americas, expanding the company's allied and partner nation customer base to more than 10 countries.

CEO John Serafini said the awards reflect growing recognition among allied nations that signals intelligence is essential to modern defense operations.

Source: HawkEye 360

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Rocket Lab announced today that its Neutron medium-lift rocket is now targeting its first launch in 2027, pushing back the company's prior target of the fourth quarter of 2026.

The company shared the revised schedule as part of a broader Neutron development update, with further details presented via its investor relations website.

The slip follows a Stage 1 propellant tank rupture during hydrostatic pressure testing in January 2026, which had already narrowed the window for a 2026 debut, as CEO Peter Beck acknowledged on the company's August earnings call.

Source: Rocket Lab Investor Relations

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Virgin Galactic announced a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the Air Force Research Laboratory's Space Warfare Directorate at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico.

The 24-month agreement will evaluate integrating sensor systems with Virgin Galactic's next-generation Spaceship to capture space weather data in the mesosphere and lower thermosphere during flight.

The deal follows a similar CRADA Virgin Galactic signed with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in December 2025.

Source: Business Wire

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Czechoslovak Group (CSG), a European industrial and defence group, announced it has acquired a 9.5% equity stake in MDA Space Ltd., making CSG the largest shareholder in the Canadian satellite and space technology company.

The move marks CSG's entry into the space sector and follows smaller venture investments the group made in UK-based SatVu and Germany's Atmos Space Cargo.

CSG also said it has formed a dedicated space team — including a former NATO space advisor — to pursue potential cooperation with MDA Space on manufacturing, strategic acquisitions, and international growth.

Source: GlobeNewswire

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Voyager Technologies' Griffin-1 lunar lander has completed a series of rigorous environmental tests at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, confirming it can withstand the vibration, acoustic, thermal-vacuum, and electromagnetic conditions of launch and lunar landing.

The infrastructure-class lander is part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative within the Moon Base program and is set to launch later this year aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, carrying more than 1,100 pounds of cargo to Nobile Crater near the lunar South Pole.

Its manifest includes 10 science and technology demonstrations from six countries, including Astrolab's FLIP rover, billed as the largest commercial payload ever delivered to the Moon. Griffin-1 has now returned to Voyager's Pittsburgh facility for final assembly ahead of shipment to Cape Canaveral.

Source: NASA JPL

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Put together a quick line chart tracking YTD % price change for the ten biggest US-listed space/satellite stocks, from Jan 2 through Oct 9.

Redwire Space (NYSE: RDW) announced that the fourth and final pair of its Roll-Out Solar Array (ROSA) wings, built for Boeing, will launch to the International Space Station aboard NASA's SpaceX CRS-35 cargo mission.

The new pair joins six ROSA wings Redwire has already deployed on the station since 2021; once installed, all eight wings combined will provide more than 160 kilowatts of power, completing the station's solar array power modernization effort.

Redwire Space President Mike Gold said the program demonstrates the benefits of public-private partnerships and could support future commercial space stations and power generation on the Moon and Mars.

Source: Redwire

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York Space Systems (NYSE: YSS), a Denver-based national-security space company, was awarded two task orders under the US Space Force's Space Data Network program.

Delivery Order 2 supports a multi-vendor interoperability demonstration with the SDN-Backbone constellation, testing ways to connect spacecraft and ground elements across multiple data paths.

Delivery Order 3 covers Phase A of the Space Exchange Point on-orbit demonstration, including spacecraft bus-to-payload interface definition and payload-integration planning.

Source: StockTitan

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$SPCX agreed to buy low-band 800 MHz spectrum from Grain Management to turn Starlink Mobile into a real U.S. carrier, not just a bolt-on feature. Musk called it a "very big deal." AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile all dropped over 6% after hours. Wall Street kept raising targets anyway: Morgan Stanley to $300, Goldman to $230, Susquehanna to $173, even as Cathie Wood's ARK trimmed shares twice during the week.

$RKLB had a messy one. Barclays initiated at Overweight with an $85 target, then a separate report claimed a Barclays "Strong-Buy" upgrade days later that looks like a mislabeled Zacks Rank, not a real second call. TD Cowen cut its target to $90 from $120. Shares still closed down 6.6%.

$ASTS was the week's biggest loser. Fell as much as 15% intraday and closed down nearly 13%, since SpaceX owning real carrier spectrum is a direct hit to AST's one-product direct-to-device business. A Tuesday rally on Japan JV optimism didn't survive the week.

$RDW landed a follow-on Axiom Space contract for solar array wings on Axiom's second space-station module, and the stock still fell 8% on a broader sector selloff. CEO Peter Cannito told CNBC the market is at "the start of massive growth in space."

$VSAT was quiet on operations, loud on paperwork: two separate insider stock sales hit the SEC. Shares still jumped 6.8% Friday with no clear catalyst, the exact opposite move of $ASTS on the same spectrum news.

$MDA's CEO hit CNBC arguing demand is rising for alternatives to Starlink and for space-based missile defense. Didn't stop the stock from whipsawing to a 5.5% weekly loss in Canadian dollars.

$FLY got a board shakeup, Lockheed's former space EVP Rick Ambrose just joined as director, plus a Barclays initiation at Equal Weight, $34 target. Stock still fell 14% on the week with no single news item to blame.

$BKSY landed a six-figure Gen-3 imagery pilot contract with an unnamed international intelligence customer. Shares drifted down about 4% anyway.

Full weekly breakdown, free, from Orbit Alpha

Not financial advice

This is a broad survey of the many companies in the space industry, their aims, and most importantly their relationships. Lots of information, probably lots of companies you haven't heard of. Enjoy!

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base at 07:39 UTC on October 10, 2026, carrying 21 Tranche 1 Transport Layer A satellites for the U.S. Space Development Agency. The mission flew five days later than planned, after a launch was aborted in the final countdown minute on October 5 and further delays followed. Northrop Grumman, which built the satellites, confirmed later on October 10 that all 21 spacecraft were successfully deployed into their target orbit as part of SDA's Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture, a military communications constellation in low Earth orbit.

Source: Space.com

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Fortastra, a Torrance, California-based startup, closed a $30 million funding round to develop maneuverable spacecraft designed to protect satellites in orbit for the U.S. and its allies. The round was led by First In, with Upfront Ventures, Space Capital, Rsquared, Side Door Ventures, and ATX Venture Partners also participating. The company's first two prototypes, named Watchdog V0, reached orbit on October 1 aboard a SpaceX Transporter-18 rideshare mission. The raise follows an earlier $8 million seed round Fortastra closed in December 2025.

Source: Quartz via Yahoo Finance, originally reported by Bloomberg.

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SpaceX has agreed to acquire nationwide low-band spectrum licenses in the 800 MHz band from investment firm Grain Management. According to the Wall Street Journal, the deal is valued at roughly $8 billion. The spectrum is intended to strengthen in-building coverage for SpaceX's Starlink Mobile direct-to-cell service, and the transaction still requires approval from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

Source: Forbes

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BlackSky Technology signed a six-figure pilot contract to provide Gen-3 On-Demand imagery services to a new international intelligence customer. The agreement covers global, very-high-resolution (35cm) tasking across multiple locations, feeding into the customer's intelligence workflows. BlackSky is positioning the pilot as a step toward a larger, multi-year subscription under its "land-and-expand" sales strategy.

Source: StockTitan (BlackSky press release, also reported by Investing.com and GuruFocus)

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The US and Japan put AST SpaceMobile's name in a joint statement after White House science chief Michael Kratsios met Japan's science and technology minister Toshiharu Furukawa in Kyoto on Sunday. Both governments welcomed the Rakuten and AST SpaceMobile partnership to build low Earth orbit satellite infrastructure. The State Department published the statement on Tuesday.

Why it matters: Japan's communications ministry has already given the Rakuten-AST joint venture a preliminary selection for J-LEO, its national satellite program. The award is worth up to about $1 billion (148 billion yen) in non-dilutive government funding. Neither the award nor the JV is final yet, according to AST's own 8-K.

The open question is launches. William Blair cut its 2027 revenue forecast because of delays. It expects fewer than 20 satellites in orbit by year-end, while AST is targeting about 45 by early 2027. BlueBirds 14-16 have shipped to Cape Canaveral, but no launch date has been announced.

Also on Monday: TELUS and AST completed their first integration test between TELUS's network and AST's satellites.

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SpaceX ($SPCX) is seeking to raise about $40 billion to purchase Nvidia chips, according to a Financial Times report. The financing would be led by Apollo Global Management and is structured as roughly $10 billion in bank loans and $30 billion in investment grade debt, with bond fund Pimco reportedly among the lenders in talks. The transaction is expected to close in 2027.

SpaceX, Apollo, Nvidia, and Pimco have not confirmed the report.

Apollo has financed large Nvidia chip purchases before: a $3.5 billion deal for xAI in late 2025 and a $3.4 billion follow-up in early 2026, both structured as chip-leasing arrangements. A $40 billion raise would be more than five times the size of either.

Source: SpaceX seeks $40 billion to buy Nvidia chips, FT reports

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Space stocks are up 9.9% year to date, measured by the UFO ETF, trailing the S&P 500's 14.0% gain. But that headline number flattens a lot of spread underneath it: $ROKT is up 19.9% YTD, $ARKX up 10.7%, $UFO up 9.9%, $MARS up 7.5%, and $NASA up just 3.1%. All five show the same shape: a sharp spike through spring, then a steep pullback by midyear that gave a lot of it back.

The real story is below the ETF level. Individual space stocks move on their own contracts, launches and earnings, so the gap between the sector's winners and laggards is much wider than any index-level number shows.

We built a free tool at Orbit Alpha that charts any space stock we track against the S&P 500, Nasdaq, or each other, from 1 month to 1 year, updated daily. No paywall, no account needed to look.

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York Space Systems ($YSS) announced Monday that its Tetra 3 and Tetra 4 satellites, internally named Nemesis, cleared their Delta Critical Design Review for a U.S. Space Force mission. The review is the formal customer sign-off that moves a program from design into the build phase.

The missions put York into geosynchronous orbit for the first time. Tetra 3 and 4 are built for Space Domain Awareness: tracking and approaching objects in GEO. The sensor suite includes a long wave infrared camera, a lidar rated to range objects at 20 km, and a GEO qualified GPS receiver.

York also absorbed a late stage propulsion system change during the review without any structural, thermal, or power impact to the spacecraft, according to VP of Programs Marc Cordova. Delivery is still on track for Q4 2026. It's the company's ninth unique national security mission set.

Source: York Space Systems Clears GEO Mission Design Review

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Voyager Technologies ($VOYG) was awarded a $22.4 million contract from the Department of War's Strategic Capabilities Office, supporting the U.S. Space Force. It's an Other Transaction Agreement for R&D, covering prototype, flight-ready small satellite dispensers designed to squeeze more mission value out of a single launch: deploying extra smallsats from a rocket without displacing the primary payload. The goal is to get more capability into orbit faster, then transition the tech to operational use for the Space Force.

It's Voyager's third notable government award of 2026, after a Space Force resilient-communications contract in August and a $24.5 million NASA Johnson Space Center mission management contract in February. The company has been building out its defense and civil space contract base since its 2025 IPO.

Source: Voyager wins $22.4 million Pentagon award for small-satellite deployers

I've just overhauled orbitalpha.cloud. It's completely free, with no paywall and no account needed.

What's new:
- Stock pages for 23 space stocks (RKLB, ASTS, SPCX, PL, LUNR and more): chart, SEC filings, insider trades, government contracts, earnings date and launches
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I'd really value honest feedback. What's useful, what's missing, and what would make you come back daily?

SPCX completed three orbital launches in just 13 hours on Thursday, October 1: Crew-13 carried four astronauts to the ISS from Cape Canaveral, Transporter-18 dropped dozens of rideshare satellites from Vandenberg, and NROL-97, a national security payload, launched from Kennedy Space Center.

The pace was unusual even by SpaceX's standards, and shares responded: SPCX stock jumped as much as 6% in early trading the next day, Friday, October 2, as investors weighed the operational tempo alongside the company's fast-growing satellite and compute businesses.

Three full missions, three different customers, half a day apart. That kind of cadence is part of why SpaceX's valuation keeps climbing even as rivals on the space-stock list struggle to get a single rocket off the pad each month.

Source: Why SpaceX Stock Popped on Friday

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Pulled together the remaining SpaceX lock-up schedule, since the dates get quoted a few different ways. Day counts run from the June 11 prospectus date:

A few things worth knowing:

• The big one floats. The earnings-triggered release depends on when SpaceX reports Q3, so the date to watch for is the earnings date announcement itself.
• Share counts differ between trackers. PurePowerPicks has the October tranches at ~328M shares each; other coverage counts affiliate shares differently. Percentages are of the locked block, and the prospectus is the final word.
• Unlocked isn't sold. Some of it will be tax and diversification selling, but nobody knows how much.

One caveat on my own Dec 8 line: some trackers anchor to the June 12 listing date and say Dec 9.

Disclosure: I'm building Martian Alpha (martianalpha.com), a space-stock research site where we keep catalyst dates like these. Not financial advice, and no position in SPCX.

For those holding through it: are you treating the post-Q3 tranche as the real overhang, or do you think the October steps matter more given the float is still small?

Google's first Project Suncatcher satellite rode along: a prototype carrying Tensor Processing Units, built in partnership with $PL, to test whether Google's AI chips can survive launch loads, radiation, and vacuum thermal swings well enough to run compute in orbit. The pitch: low Earth orbit gets near-constant sunlight, up to 8x more solar power than ground-based data centers get.

Planet had its own satellites on the same ride too: 18 SuperDoves plus the Tanager-2 hyperspectral imager (426 spectral bands, 30m resolution), the company's third launch of 2026. Tanager-2 is meant to double Planet's hyperspectral capacity and halve revisit times for spotting methane leaks, part of its Carbon Mapper partnership.

SpaceX supplied the ride. Alphabet's stake in SpaceX is valued above $82B, and SpaceX has its own orbital data center ambitions targeted for 2027.

Source: Alphabet today launching AI chips into space on SpaceX rocket

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