Space Systems Command Funds Five Fight Tonight Solutions to Pressing USSF Challenges

Published Feb. 23, 2026
By Lisa Sodders, SSC Public Affairs

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. -- A containerized backup gateway/GEP (ground entry point) and four other technological solutions to pressing U.S. Space Force challenges were announced as the winners of Space Systems Command’s (SSC) “Fight Tonight” competition Feb. 12, 2026. The competition, now in its fourth consecutive year, encourages military and civilian employees to identify technologies that build upon U.S. Space Force (USSF) capabilities or introduce new ones.

“SSC’s annual workforce innovation competition clearly showcases the level of talent our team brings to the table not just once a year, but every single day,” said USSF Lt. Gen. Philip Garrant, SSC commander. “The increased collaboration we see each year as the Fight Tonight program continues to grow really demonstrates that partnership is necessary for maintaining space superiority.”

In this year’s competition, SSC, the capability acquisition arm of USSF, teamed with the service’s innovation arm, SpaceWERX, to rapidly accelerate novel technology adoption by leveraging Tactical Funding Increase (TACFI), the pathway, created to transition smaller-scale, operational-level capabilities into U.S. Space Force or Department of the Air Force programs.

The overall Fight Tonight competition winner tackled a new technology that builds upon the Small Business Innovation Research Phase II effort to form a containerized backup gateway/GEP (ground entry point) that is hidden in plain sight, transportable, and resilient while simultaneously able to quick switch MilComm (& other) satellites in various orbits.
“Fight Tonight” entrants were competing for a total potential funding pool of up to $24 million for eligible SBIR Phase II initiatives, with SSC putting forward up to $12 million in funding and SpaceWERX matching up to $2 million per project.

SSC’s Business Innovation Office served as the organizers and managers of the campaign.
Capt. Erin Lindsey, chief of business innovation, said the eight finalist teams presented projects that had already showed promise as a SBIR Phase 1 project and the competing teams were now looking to see if they could be scaled and accelerated with TACFI funding.

Teams were encouraged to look at a SpaceWERX roster of eligible projects covering alternative position, navigation and timing; the USSF Digital Spaceport of the Future; Tactically Responsive Space; and Sustained Space Maneuver.

For the final round in January, eight finalist teams presented their ideas to Fight Tonight’s team of judges including SSC’s Lt. Gen. Garrant; Maj. Gen. Stephen Purdy, military deputy, acting assistant secretary of the Air Force and service acquisition executive for space within the office of the assistant secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and integration; and Lt. Gen. Gregory Gagnon, commander, U.S. Space Force Combat Forces Command.

This year’s competition winner, Global Backup Gateway (GoBaG), was presented during the finals competition by Daniel Godwin in SSC’s SYD 88 and Capt. Michael Cumming in SYD 84.

“Our current ground entry points for WGS and missile warning/tracking need to keep pace with our proliferated space architectures,” Cumming said. “If one goes down, we're looking at extended operational impacts across the theater.”

“Generals,” Cumming said in his pitch, “We have to do better [with ground infrastructure] and we have a solution.”

The system expands upon the SBIR Phase II to provide a resilient, low observable backup, mil Ka-Band, GEP or TT&C (telemetry, tracking and control) terminal. This Fight Tonight effort increases the number of embedded high-performance Rx phased arrays.

“We're not just improving ground infrastructure, this is about ensuring our most critical missions, the ones that save lives and deter adversaries, have resilient, flexible, distributed ground architecture,” Cumming said.

The four other winning projects which will also receive funding are:

Advanced Command and Control Extension for Space Systems (ACCESS) - Infinity Systems Engineering, presented by Matthew Navarro, SYD 831 during the finals competition.

“We stand ready to scale access into a usable capability focused on solving urgent GPS resiliency needs and challenges and expanding the PNT SA (Position Navigation Timing Situational Awareness),” Navarro pitched.

“GPS in general is critical to our national defense,” Navarro said. “We don’t want to leave realizable PNT capabilities on the table.” Navarro referred to PNT SA messages for civil and military users to help monitor NAV signal performance, which he said also happens to be CFC's number one PNT priority.

ACCESS, a Cloud-based, cyber-secure mission management and command control solution, can help to extend the GPS control capabilities through a lot of existing plug-and-play interfaces. The open architecture and flexible innovation would increase Space Force’s PNT Situational Awareness, Rapid Warfighter Effects (e.g. near real-time spot beam tasking, zero age of data, extended autonomous navigation), and integration of the GPS crosslink constellation into OCX and Space Date Network’s MILNET.

Echo 2 AI for Decision Superiority - Velocity Explorations Inc., presented by Wuan Perkins, SSC/S6 and Lt. Feiyu Xue, SSC 2 SLS/DOB. Echo is an AI-powered Command & Control (C2) tool that listens, interprets, and synthesizes human communications and operational data in real time, turning unstructured voice and text as well as disconnected data into actionable insights.

“Each launch involves up to 30 operators who monitor a multitude of channels,” Perkins explained. “No human can effectively process that much live information at once. Echo allows our operators the mental space to do what humans do best: critically think and problem-solve. Post launch, each operator conducts a review that can take up to six hours. Echo dramatically streamlines that: using conservative operated validated assumptions, Echo returns over 150,000 hours every year, the equivalent of adding 75 operators to launch operations without increasing manpower or risk. And that return grows as each launch cadence grows.”

“On console, I monitor multiple voice channels while tracking my mechanical system's readiness for launch,” Xue said. “Miscommunication can be the difference between mission success and failure during anomalies. As an on-console operator, ECHO delivers live transcriptions of summaries that describe anomalies and alert operators immediately. The system also provides historical documentation, making every launch a searchable record that operators can instantly reference for review of previous examples.”

Already validated across Space Launch, Mission Assurance, Naval, and Tactical Operations, Echo delivers a real-time common operational picture that accelerates decision-making and enhances situational awareness. With Fight Tonight funding, Echo is ready to scale from proven prototypes to a fielded capability that transforms how the U.S. military commands, controls, and wins.

Refueling Pods / Propellant Orbit Delivery (POD) - Katalyst Space Technologies, presented by Capt. Ginny Weinert, SYD 80. The Propellant Orbital Delivery (POD) will create a proliferated network of interoperable refueling pods to deliver any propellant on any OTV and to be installed by any robotic spacecraft for additional deltaV (measure of the change in velocity a spacecraft must undergo to complete a mission) for any prepared asset on the front lines, enabling additional maneuvering for sustainable space superiority.

“Sustained space maneuver is crucial for the fight,” Weinert said. “Senior leaders deliberate how space craft maneuver because every maneuver expends a satellite's fuel and effectively shortens its life. The propellant orbital delivery uses a game-changing approach with existing tech to plug-and-play with what SSC already uses.”

High-value space assets become unusable once fuel has been spent. Replacement is prohibitively expensive. POD offers a single, flexible solution that integrates disparate technologies such as fuel type and refueling interfaces. POD envisions creating a space highway featuring refueling stations to allow for greater number of dynamic movements in space per spacecraft via complete refueling of an asset in orbit.

“POD is compatible on any orbit with any OTV, any robotic servicer and all SSC approved refilling interfaces and this modular solution will service and scale immediate needs for space maneuver warfare by next year,” Weinert said.

Cyber Research On-Orbit (CROO) - Proof Labs, presented by Grant Huang within SSC’s Space Systems Integration Office and Joseph “Dan” Trujillo, Air Force Research Laboratory. CROO is an AI/ML driven cyber protection software that analyzes subsystem telemetry and onboard software activities to detect and respond to cyber intrusion. CROO protects the entire attack surface, including firmware and the operating system of satellites.

Geographic assignment of threats both in orbital regions and terrestrial regions will allow USSF to identify aggressors. CROO also will enable machine-speed cyber defense aligned with Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2).

Trujillo explained, “Through CROO, persistent real-time monitoring of satellite systems for indicators of compromise (IoCs) would ensure threats are detected at the earliest point of origin before they affect tactical users on the ground.”