A longtime space advocate is stepping away from the space resources company he helped found more than five years ago and now plans to help develop the next generation of space startups. SpaceNews.com

FY-19 NDAA: Lawmakers are diving deeper into DoD acquisition strategies and space capabilities, particularly launch. SpaceNews.com

Eurockot’s Launch Services last mission using the Russian-German Rockot launcher took place successfully April 25 from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Northern Russia. SpaceNews.com

GAO: “Implementing a strategy to support multiple launch providers may prove challenging." SpaceNews.com

Thermo Capital, owner of Globalstar, is merging the satellite operator with a landline company it owns in a $1.65 billion deal intended to help pay off Globalstar’s debts. SpaceNews.com

Northrop Grumman executives said April 25 that the company declined to submit a proposal for the next set of GPS 3 satellites, all but guaranteeing that Lockheed Martin will win the competition. SpaceNews.com

The remote sensing industry is trying to contribute to “global transparency,” said Walter Scott, chief technology officer of Maxar Technologies and founder of DigitalGlobe. SpaceNews.com

The House of Representatives approved legislation April 24 that would reform commercial remote sensing regulation and create a licensing regime for “non-traditional” commercial space activities. SpaceNews.com

Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson made news last week at the Space Symposium with major announcements on the reorganization of Space and Missile Systems Center and the standup of a new office to eliminate bottlenecks in the system. SpaceNews.com

Iceye, the Finnish company flying a Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) microsatellite, forged an alliance with Ursa Space Systems, a firm that offers economic insights from geospatial data. SpaceNews.com

Countering WMDs is a major intelligence fusion challenge. Thomas: “Even for an organization that prides itself in agility, which we do, this is some incredibly problem solving.” SpaceNews.com

Geospatial data companies are focusing intently on acquiring satellite imagery quickly and speeding data delivery to customers. SpaceNews.com

The light-lift Vega rocket is Europe’s vehicle of choice for small satellites, but has mainly launched spacecraft weighing hundreds of kilograms. While that’s smaller than what Arianespace normally launches on an Ariane 5 or Soyuz, it’s not the “small” that people generally think of when they think smallsats. SpaceNews.com

Lockheed Martin executives said April 24 they are confident they will win an Air Force competition for the next set of GPS 3 navigation satellites as questions swirl about what other companies, if any, submitted proposals. SpaceNews.com

An Ariane 5 launch has been cancelled after an unexplained problem with an Indian space agency satellite that was supposed to ride on the mission. SpaceNews.com

In its quest for cutting edge commercial solutions to military problems, the U.S. Defense Innovation Unit Experimental (DIUx) is not ignoring the talents of traditional government contractors. SpaceNews.com

Speedcast’s revenues more than doubled in 2017 as the satellite network operator began leveraging its acquisitions of U.S. companies Harris CapRock and UltiSat. SpaceNews.com

NGA Director Cardillo: “I want the market to work … but government shouldn’t be their first customer. We should be their second customer.” SpaceNews.com

NASA’s new administrator said he’s “very excited” about leading the space agency as he takes office after an extended confirmation process. SpaceNews.com

USD Kernan: "we really haven’t taken all the advantage we can of technology.” SpaceNews.com