WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army has wrapped up a one-year pilot project exploring outsourcing satellite communications services to private companies, but the long-term future of such arrangements remains unclear.
Under the pilot, the Army selected satellite operators Intelsat and SES to provide “satcom as a managed service,” a model where the provider handles all satellite communications functions — from setup and maintenance of equipment to network management and technical support — through a subscription-based contract.
The project, officially completed on Sept. 30, is now raising questions about whether the Department of Defense will expand its reliance on commercial satcom providers for long-term military communications needs.
David Broadbent, president of Intelsat’s Government Solutions, said that while the pilot program demonstrated the efficiency of managed services, it is still uncertain if the Army will fully embrace this model for future satellite communications (satcom) procurement.
“The current approach to acquiring satcom is inefficient,” Broadbent said Oct. 14. “This managed-services model is the way of the future.”
The 12-month trial showed how commercial providers could offer the latest equipment and customer service, he added. Intelsat’s managed network, for instance, combined its Flex service for geostationary (GEO) satcom with commercial low-earth orbit (LEO) satellite services, covering 10 different locations under varied weather and terrain conditions, from extreme cold to high humidity.
Satcom contracting ‘disjointed’
Currently, military satcom is “very disjointed,” Broadbent explained, with multiple vendors involved in handling terminals, ground stations, and satellite services, creating inefficiencies and slowing deployment times. “The pilot program showed that Army organizations could get satcom services under one contract, managing the whole service end-to-end.”
According to Broadbent, feedback from the Army has been positive. “The users like it. They like the flexibility to deploy the network on demand,” he said.
The future of managed services for military satcom may also hinge on funding. Broadbent expects future defense budgets to include funding to scale these services into an official program.
The pilot’s completion comes as Intelsat and SES are in merger talks, with both companies competing in the U.S. Space Force’s Proliferated Low Earth Orbit (PLEO) Satellite-Based Services contract, which provides satcom services under an indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) structure.
However, Broadbent noted that the PLEO contract does not offer the military the flexibility it needs, as users like the Army often prefer to have more control over budget and procurement processes.
“They don’t necessarily love the idea of having to aggregate their LEO requirements and go through the Commercial Satellite Communications Office (CSCO),” Broadbent said, suggesting that the type of managed, multi-orbit service tested in the pilot would likely be acquired directly through Army channels rather than via the PLEO contract.
Budget and procurement hurdles
The challenges of integrating commercial satcom services into military procurement processes were discussed last week at the Potomac Officers Club’s GovCon International Summit, where Broadbent pointed out inefficiencies in the defense acquisition process. “It isn’t necessarily set up efficiently to deal with the kind of innovation and flexibility that we really need,” he said during a panel discussion.
Jeremy Leader, deputy director of the Commercial Space Office at the Space Systems Command, echoed some of Broadbent’s concerns, highlighting the need for more resilient military communications systems that can incorporate commercial solutions. However, one obstacle, Leader noted, is that budget officials often view commercial services as redundant, given the existence of government-owned satellites.
“A lot of times budgeteers, when we say the word resiliency, they hear duplication,” Leader said at the GovCon event. He also suggested that military requirements should sometimes align more closely with what the commercial market can offer, rather than expecting private companies to fully tailor their services to military specifications.
