AFWERX, an innovation arm of the Department of the Air Force and powered by the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), serves as a facilitator, connecting the Air Force, Space Force with cutting-edge American ingenuity from small businesses and start-ups. AFWERX operates several programs like Ventures, Spark, Prime and Spacewerx to expand the defense industrial base for advanced technologies and accelerate the transition of technology. It partners with organizations like Keystone Space Collaborative and Astrobotic to create innovation hubs and drive collaboration with industry, academia, and government.
All verified mentions of this organization in source documents.
Loft Orbital was previously awarded an AFWERX SBIR Phase I contract.
Space Micro received five separate SBIR/STTR contracts in 2021-01-01 from the U.S. Army, U.S. Air Force AFWERX, and NASA.
Solstar Space is a participant in the AFWERX SBIR Phase 1 cohort and will conduct feasibility studies with the Department of Defense to demonstrate how the company’s onboard satellite Critical Data Relay supports continuous connectivity and provides global communications for spacecraft in low Earth orbit.
Phase Four received a $750,000 Phase 2 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) award from the U.S. Air Force’s AFWERX program to test iodine in a prototype version of its Maxwell thruster.
In 2020 AFWERX awarded about $700,000,000 in Small Business Innovation Research contracts to small businesses.
AFWERX was created in 2017 to improve the Air Force’s relationship with the private sector and make the military a more attractive customer for entrepreneurs and investors.
AFWERX Phase 1 SBIR awards provide $50,000 for studies and Phase 2 and Phase 3 follow-on contracts can be worth up to $3,000,000.
AFWERX officials indicated up to $100,000,000 could be invested in Space Prime over the next year.
The AFWERX program of the United States Air Force has launched SpaceWERX, a technology accelerator office in Los Angeles.
Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson launched AFWERX on 2017-07-21, during a visit to Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada.
The Launch Company was selected among the top finalists in 2020’s AFWERX Challenge and is pursuing a prototype of its site design.
Descartes Labs received a Direct to Phase II AFWERX contract in July 2020 to create a single source of truth for the Air Force by fusing together multi-sensor data.
AFWERX selected HawkEye 360 as one of the top 26 participating teams out of 809 total teams in the EngageSpace challenge on 2020-10-15.
Xage Security won a $743,000 Phase Two Small Business Innovation Research contract from AFWERX to develop, evaluate, and prepare a data protection strategy for the U.S. Space Force.
Xage Security began working with AFWERX in late 2019 under a Phase One SBIR contract worth about $50,000.
AFWERX selected Benchmark Space Systems as one of 178 participating teams from the AFWERX Space Challenge to exhibit at the EngageSpace virtual event on 2020-09-29-30, 2020.
AFWERX established a contract vehicle as part of the event to allow Department of Defense users to immediately gain access to developing technologies presented by the 30 selected companies.
AFWERX was launched by the U.S. Air Force in 2017 as a dual-purpose technology accelerator program focused on commercially viable companies with dual-use technologies.
The AFWERX contract vehicle was open for government organizations to use until 2020-09-30.
On 2020-08-18 Viasat was one of 30 industry teams competitively selected by the U.S. Air Force AFWERX program to virtually demonstrate new and emerging capabilities.