Alt PNT Reverse Industry Day is First Event in New COSMIC Center

Published June 21, 2023
By SSC Public Affairs

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. -- Space Systems Command (SSC) hosted a two-day Alternative/Augmented Position, Navigation, and Timing Reverse Industry Day event June 7-8 at its new COSMIC Collaboration Center in Chantilly, Virginia.

The goal of the event was to understand the “art of the possible” for alternative sources and integration of positioning, navigation, and timing information, to enhance and compliment current Global Positioning System (GPS) architecture performance and resilience.

“As a country, we are reliant on precise positioning, navigation, and time synchronization data,” said Mr. Cordell DeLaPena, program executive officer for Military Communications and Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (MilComm and PNT) at SSC.

“The conventional satellite-based GPS system is a universal source of such information and remains a fundamental construct for navigation but may not be available either due to natural obstacles, or man-made hindrances such as jamming or spoofing,” DeLaPena said.

During the two-day event led by SSC’s MilComm and PNT office, senior DoD officials interfaced directly with more than 200 industry attendees representing more than 80 companies. Attendees, in-person and virtually, participated in government briefings, presentations, breakout sessions and one-on-one meetings.

Industry capabilities and future concepts for providing expedient solutions to augment PNT were discussed, as well as operational capabilities designed to rapidly acquire, launch and operate on-orbit assets to deter adversary actions, respond to on-orbit threats, and augment existing capabilities. These alternative/augmented PNT concepts included rapid launch, space vehicles, command and control, receivers, and integration with Space Force operators.

Government attendees included representatives from SSC, Space Operations Command, Headquarters Space Staff, Department of Transportation, National Space-Based PNT Coordination Office, Air Force Research Laboratory, Space Development Agency, other government agencies, and some U.S. allies.

“The Alternative/Augmented PNT Reverse Industry Day event was a great opportunity for government and industry to come together to better understand the future vision and share ideas on advancing Position, Navigation and Timing space capabilities,” said Barbara Baker, Deputy PEO for MilComm & PNT. “Our collaborative sessions with industry will serve as a building block to advance PNT future as we look to leverage the entire space community’s strengths and encourage innovation.”

The Reverse Industry Day event was SSC’s first event held in the new COSMIC facility. COSMIC, which stands for Commercial Space Marketplace for Innovation and Collaboration, is a partnership between SSC and Virginia Tech Applied Research Corporation (VT-ARC), to help SSC collaborate with commercial industry, drive synergies with government agency partners, and deliver capabilities to the warfighter with greater speed and cost efficiency.