China is expanding its space activities with new lunar missions, Long March family launch vehicles, and infrastructure for future cislunar operations.

The Wenchang Space Launch Site has become China's main hub for missions that require large-capacity launch vehicles.

The Long March 5 entered service in 2016.

Orbital expects the constellation to have more than 10 GW of aggregate computing power.

Orbital-1 is Orbital’s first satellite designed specifically for orbital computing.

Orbital plans to build Factory-1 in South Bay, Los Angeles for satellite assembly and testing.

Orbital will use the capital for the Pathfinder demonstration mission and initial development of Orbital-1.

Orbital’s Pathfinder mission is scheduled for 2027.

Orbital-1 is the operational follow-on to the Pathfinder demonstration mission.

Orbital’s planned Factory-1 facility will support assembly and testing of satellites.

Orbital’s systems are designed to support AI inference applications in space.

a16z speedrun led Orbital’s $5 million pre-seed round.

Orbital plans a constellation of more than 100,000 satellites.

Orbital’s systems will be based on NVIDIA’s Vera Rubin Space-1 GPU architecture.

Orbital raised a $5 million pre-seed round to accelerate development of satellites dedicated to low-Earth-orbit computing.

Basis Set, Human Element, Wayfinder, Antler, Anti Fund, Ascent, Rubik, Zero Knowledge Ventures, LYVC, Feld Ventures, New Legacy, FNDR, UpHonest, and Asterisk participated in Orbital’s pre-seed round.

Orbital plans to build a distributed network of satellites for AI workloads.

Orbital’s Pathfinder mission will test space-based computing, radiation tolerance, thermal performance, and data transmission to Earth.

Orbital’s Pathfinder mission will carry a GPU payload on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

Orbital’s production satellites are designed to reach 100 kW of computing capacity each.

a16z’s startup accelerator Speedrun led Orbital’s pre-seed funding round.

Orbital’s satellites will be about the size of a fridge and will use tennis court-sized solar arrays.

Each Orbital satellite will be capable of generating 100 kW of power.

Orbital’s network will use optical intersatellite links.

Orbital plans to build and launch a constellation of more than 100,000 satellites.

Orbital raised a $5 million pre-seed funding round for a new orbital-data-center constellation.

Basis Set, Human Element, Wayfinder Ventures, Antler, Anti Fund, Ascent Venture Partners, Rubik Ventures, Zero Knowledge Ventures, LYVC, Feld Ventures, New Legacy, FNDR, UpHonest Capital, and Asterisk participated in Orbital’s pre-seed funding round.

Orbital plans to launch its first full satellite, Orbital-1, in 2028.

Orbital plans to rely heavily on automation in its Los Angeles satellite production facility to produce low-cost satellites quickly.

Orbital is developing its first satellite production facility in Los Angeles.

Orbital is designing its satellites around NVIDIA’s Space-1 Vera Rubin GPU.

Orbital’s orbital-data-center concept relies on a network of relatively smaller satellites that can handle large AI inference workloads and remain in constant contact with the ground.

Orbital plans to launch its first demo mission in 2027.

Orbital’s first demo mission will send an NVIDIA Blackwell chip on a partner satellite to test Orbital’s thermal management and radiation shielding technology.

The customer required guaranteed collection cadence in the Satellogic contract.

The National Reconnaissance Office’s first tranche of Strategic Commercial Enhancements Commercial Solutions Opening contracts covers non-Earth-imaging, medium-wave infrared, and radio frequency sensing capabilities.

NASA awarded positions under the Commercial Smallsat Data Acquisition IDIQ contract to BlackSky, ICEYE US, MDA Geospatial Service, Pixxel Space Technologies, Planet Labs Federal, Satellogic Federal, Teledyne Brown Engineering, and The Tomorrow Companies.

The NASA Commercial Smallsat Data Acquisition IDIQ contract runs through November 2028.

The National Reconnaissance Office selected HEO, SatVu, and Sierra Nevada Corporation in the first tranche of its Strategic Commercial Enhancements Commercial Solutions Opening program.

The National Reconnaissance Office added ICEYE US to the Strategic Commercial Enhancements Commercial Solutions Opening panel in May 2026.

The Satellogic contract runs for one year.

NASA awarded a $476 million Commercial Smallsat Data Acquisition IDIQ contract in September 2024.

The National Reconnaissance Office issued a press release in February 2026 confirming the first tranche of contracts under its Strategic Commercial Enhancements Commercial Solutions Opening program.

Satellogic signed an $18 million contract on May 26, 2026 with an international defense customer for persistent, high-frequency Earth observation monitoring.

The NASA Commercial Smallsat Data Acquisition IDIQ contract was designed to support high-frequency, multi-source data delivery.

Satellogic closed a separate seven-figure monitoring agreement in January 2026 with a strategic partner.

The January 2026 Satellogic monitoring agreement was structured around high-frequency persistent delivery.

With both Tranche 1 production lots delivered, York Space Systems will have placed more than 40 Tranche 1 spacecraft on orbit.

York Space Systems completed the second production lot at half the cost of competing contractors on the program.

The summer SpaceX Falcon 9 launch will carry the complete second production lot as a dedicated payload.