True Anomaly will take its space-security work far afield next year.
The Colorado-based startup, which aims to make space a safer and more sustainable realm for the U.S. government and its partners and allies, revealed today (April 3) that it plans to send its Jackal satellites to geosynchronous orbit (GEO) and cislunar (Earth-moon) space in 2026.
"Beyond LEO [low Earth orbit], GEO and cislunar are obvious extensions of the Jackal platform and represent critical domains within the space superiority mission set," True Anomaly CEO and co-founder Even Rogers said in a statement today.
True Anomaly, which was founded in 2022, bills Jackal as an autonomous orbital vehicle — "a multi-role spacecraft with a modular architecture that delivers cost-effective, scalable performance and maximum operational flexibility," according to the statement.
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Jackal's designers "set out to define an entirely new category of spacecraft — one that sets the performance benchmark for space superiority," the statement continues.
That performance is achieved, among other things, by high-maneuverability propulsion and an intelligent operating system that together allow for complex operations, such as the close approach and observation of other spacecraft.
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Jackal has been to space already: The company sent two of the satellites to LEO in March 2024, on SpaceX's Transporter-10 rideshare mission. Both satellites deployed their solar panels and successfully generated power, but they were not able to conduct a rendezvous test as planned.
A third Jackal launched in December on Bandwagon-2, another SpaceX rideshare effort. True Anomaly has notched a number of milestones with that mission, which may still be active.
And another Jackal is scheduled to launch later this year: One of the satellites will ride a Firefly Aerospace Alpha rocket to orbit, for a rapid-response U.S. Space Force mission called Victus Haze.
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True Anomaly's release does not discuss the planned missions to GEO and cislunar space in detail. But it does stress why these off-Earth realms are so important to U.S. national security.
GEO, for example, is a favored spot for spy satellites, because it's the altitude (22,236 miles, or 35,786 kilometers) at which orbital velocity matches the speed of Earth's rotation. Spacecraft in GEO therefore "hover" over the same patch of the planet, allowing continuous observation.
And U.S. officials have repeatedly said that the country is engaged in a space race with China, with the moon as the destination. Both nations aim to establish bases near the lunar south pole, which is thought to be rich in water ice.
"As global lunar activities increase, threats in cislunar orbits will quickly follow," True Anomaly said in today's statement. "No future lunar economy can exist without a robust lunar satellite infrastructure, and by investing in cislunar today, True Anomaly is developing scalable, cost-effective solutions that will help safeguard lunar operations and defense capabilities well into the future."