SSC’s Next Industry Day to Focus on Space Domain Awareness

  • Published
  • By Lisa Sodders, SSC Public Affairs
Space Systems Command (SSC) officials and other agencies involved in Space Domain Awareness (SDA) will meet with traditional and non-traditional space industry professionals July 28 in Colorado Springs to exchange ideas and methods to execute SDA missions at the next SSC Industry Day.

“Strengthening partnerships with industry and having valuable dialogue is critical as the space acquisition community seeks the most innovative and creative solutions in order to get after the threat and challenges facing the nation today in space,” said Col. Rich Kniseley, Chief of the Enterprise Requirements and Architectures Division, at SSC’s Space Systems Integration Office.

“By listening to our industry partners and understanding their approaches and technological abilities, it provides us better insight on how to focus our investments and we can take advantage of the best the commercial space industry has to offer,” Kniseley said.

The unclassified event later this month will follow SSC’s traditional Industry Day approach with a full agenda of government presentations from around the SDA community, including but not limited to SSC Acquisition Deltas, U.S. Space Command, SSC's Front Door and Commercial Services Offices, the JTF-SD Commercial Operations Cell, the USSF 19 Space Defense Squadron, Air Force Research Laboratory, and many others.
 
While the July event follows the traditional Industry Day format, SSC’s Industry Day series also includes "reverse industry" style events, where SSC officials and subject matter experts meet with commercial companies to talk about different problem sets facing the U.S. Space Force. Industry input helps to shape how the USSF pursues those problem sets, and helps identify what needs to be purchased, said Lt. Col. Vinny Pande, branch chief of the Persistent Tactical Sensing branch within SSC’s Space Sensing program executive office.
 
“Reverse Industry Day is an opportunity for the government to have a less active speaking role and a more active listening role to what industry can offer – not just in terms of responding to a Request for Proposal or to a solicitation, but what can industry offer towards the problems or capabilities that government is pursuing,” Pande said.

In addition to active participation from the U.S. Department of Defense and the intelligence community, Pande said there has been growing interest in the Reverse Industry Days from non-traditional companies, who might not have the robust business development teams and networks of former government officials that larger, defense “prime” contractors have.

“These smaller companies have far fewer opportunities to get in front of government materiel leaders, commanders and senior leaders and this is an opportunity for them to level-set the playing field with the big companies in terms of having that access,” Pande said.

A Reverse Industry Day, held in May in partnership with the Aerospace Industries Association, focused on tactical intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR). Industry Days scheduled for Aug. 24-25 will focus on Tactically Responsive Space on the Aerospace Corporation campus in El Segundo, said Capt. Nathan P. Weiss, SSC’s Space Safari program manager.

“In some areas, the commercial space industry has innovated faster than the government, and often there’s a commercial solution for the Space Force’s needs,” Weiss said. “There’s certainly some efficiency to be gained using the buy-before-build approach and often, we can get what we need by bringing on a commercial provider rather than a traditional Government procurement.”
 
For more information about upcoming industry events please visit SSC Front Door and to register for SSC’s July 28 Space Domain Awareness Industry Days, please click here.