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Hybrid Space Architecture and the Pathway to a New Space Ecosystem

INTRODUCTION

Integrating the new commercial space industry’s capabilities with traditional space mission capabilities is desirable because there are complementary benefits. As a first step in this direction, the government is working toward an architecture that is resilient by design, known as the Hybrid Space Architecture (HSA). HSA is an information-based architecture that supports the integration and aggregation of emergent New Space small satellite capabilities with traditional U.S. government and allied space systems. This framework also embraces orbital diversity and encourages platforms to go to the best orbit to achieve their mission. HSA also assumes that a mission is achieved through multiple platforms providing constituent components of a system-of-systems, not the historical model, where mission and platform were often synonymous. In addition to enhanced capability and cost savings through partnership, the natural synergies that are provided among the HSA, operational, and science and technology (S&T)/research and development (R&D) communities will be a significant driver in shaping a space ecosystem that provides utility to a broad range of space users. It achieves this by:

• Distributing risk: Increasing satellite population provides strength in numbers and diversity.
• Allowing rapid innovation: Incorporating rapid insertion of new technologies as they mature.
• Improving interoperability: Allowing interoperability among U.S. government, allied, and commercial space systems.
• Fostering public–private partnerships (PPPs): Enabling U.S. and allied governments to benefit from capabilities in the commercial sectors.

HSA relies on individual agents performing specific roles where their products and services are integrated together and can be tailored for a variety of stakeholder needs. It is anticipated that HSA will provide an initial impetus to create an ecosystem capable of supporting a spectrum of traditional and nontraditional stakeholders. Traditional stakeholders are those that are structured vertically, with everything owned and managed under one line of control. Nontraditional stakeholders, on the other hand, are not sufficiently large, scoped, or funded to have everything “in-house.” This requires a model where nontraditional stakeholders can participate through a “pay as you go” approach, without necessarily acquiring ownership or control of large, capital-intensive infrastructure elements. However, the ecosystem will require the development of business cases and partnerships in order to incorporate the broad range of capabilities from private industry. If these incentives are successful, the

initial efforts can be expanded to incorporate new users who traditionally could not independently be served by the legacy architecture because of high costs and significant time-to-completion burdens. Many of those new users are science-based organizations of the federal government. Their ability to integrate into the expanding ecosystem will provide new sensors and systems and lay the foundation for the next segment of information growth. This chapter describes how HSA is facilitating the initiation of the New Space ecosystem through integrating legacy systems and new commercial capabilities.

TRADITIONAL SPACE ARCHITECTURE

The legacy space architecture currently utilized by the U.S. government was originally developed primarily to support high-level government strategic users. Historically, space was an expensive domain with a high barrier to entry, requiring significant capital to field a capability. Thus, only high-priority user needs could be serviced. These users include the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), the Department of Defense (DoD), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and other government organizations. The typical architecture was based on roughly 10-year planning cycles, mission-unique system and satellite designs, and a significant amount of investment in each system. That approach resulted in highly reliable systems, one-of-a-kind technology, and special-purpose missions. This approach is often referred to as mission based. Examples of the mission-based systems are the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES); the Landsat series of spacecraft; and the GPS or Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) constellations on the DoD side. This approach is not adaptable to government users requiring shorter planning cycles, having smaller budgets, or having special requirements.

Hybrid Space Architecture

A New Space ecosystem opens the door to the consideration for a multi-layer system architecture that would aggregate multiple information sources, whether they be from traditional space, SmallSat systems, commercial services, or foreign partners to collectively enhance the information pipeline to the end user, while supporting increased on-orbit capability and overall resiliency. This multi-layer system architecture is called HSA. HSA is not a prescriptive solution but rather a broad architecture framework with the flexibility to integrate capabilities from multiple systems to meet a variety of differing user informational needs.

HSA has the potential to dramatically contribute to the missions of a broad array of national security users and other government stakeholders through the development of an ecosystem that will utilize PPPs, which will enable different components to the architecture. This new architecture will also provide a clear leap forward for nontraditional or new users who previously had limited access or no access to the data provided by traditional systems.

FULLY ENABLING THE HYBRID SPACE ARCHITECTURE

As outlined in the previous chapter, commercial systems are becoming increasingly more capable in a broad array of applications, including Earth observation data collection, providing inter-satellite communications, supporting an increase in cadence of launch of SmallSats, and providing ground network services. At its core, HSA is a framework that enables the integration of these emergent commercial space systems with the more traditional government and allied capabilities. Such an architecture will leverage satellite systems and services that are (1) large and small; (2) government and commercial; (3) U.S. and allied; and (4) in various, diverse, and layered orbits.

Several essential elements will allow HSA to benefit a broad set of users. These elements include (1) embracing all sources of information (U.S. government, allied, non-allied [e.g., Brazil, Sweden], and commercial); (2) maximized interoperability and interconnectivity; (3) a variable trust framework for integration and aggregation of information sources; and (4) autonomy at multiple levels of the architecture, such as automation of scheduling and packet network routing through diverse communication paths. Instead of a single satellite or a distributed homogeneous constellation providing a single source or type of data, this information-centric approach utilizes all available information sources from multiple satellites or constellations, as well as terrestrial sources of informa-

tion, and integrates them to meet mission-specific needs. Furthermore, because the hybrid approach provides a variety of communications paths, information can be delivered via various routes, providing inherent resilience. Various trades involving such parameters as orbital regimes, number of satellites, altitudes, data delivery rates/deadlines, inclinations, spacing/phasing, sensor types, performance, and sensing frequency are necessary to meet specific mission needs.

This open framework enabling the ingestion of multiple sources of information will provide many important benefits, including improving the architectural resilience in the face of increasingly technically capable adversaries. Strength in numbers and diversity distributes risk, and provides graceful degradation, which will mitigate “the inherent vulnerability associated with small numbers of high-value assets in the current architecture.”¹ This will enable missions to be completed despite interruptions in service. A variable trust approach to provide a networking framework for rapid and secure data exchange among systems will be required. This framework makes decisions and takes actions based on the trust of the derived data sources—ensuring the security and integrity of all data and services.

TECHNOLOGIES KEY TO A SUCCESSFUL HSA

With the growth and diversity of the space community, significant capability is coming on line through allied and commercial sources. The previous space architecture was designed to be single source to the terrestrial user and was not scalable to meet the need of resiliency and capacity. The HSA model provides the ability to deploy dedicated capability while taking advantage of opportunistic sources. To fully realize the benefits of an HSA, a number of key technologies are required in order to integrate the distributed set of inputs into a coherent set of timely data products. In many cases, these technologies exist in other industries or applications, but may still require adaptation prior to integration and full-scale operations.

An HSA, by definition, consists of heterogeneous sensors and platforms supported by a variety of diverse infrastructure elements, all targeted toward a particular customer or business case, but rarely the same requirement. At the point of first contact, where the sensor acquires the raw data or phenomenology (and because there is inherently a large volume of raw data being ingested), in certain cases there is a need for robust data processing resources and capabilities at the “edge” (e.g., processing on the satellite). This need is driven partially by the large amount of data being collected, not all of which is germane to the objectives of the specific mission. Therefore, the sensor element of the architecture, or the edge, requires the capability to distill the relevant data that is needed from other less valuable data sources. A similar example can be given to users of mobile photography whose default picture-taking setting reduces the raw photo to a sharable size. For some users, the ability to store the raw image is available but comes with greater constraints. However, if all users shared the raw image, it would unnecessarily create a significant network data volume burden.

The costs and inherent delays associated with transmitting large amounts of raw data to the ground for analysis and then to upload actionable commands is inefficient and open to exploitation by adversaries and other risks. Therefore, some level of onboard processing is needed to reduce the amount of critical data to be transmitted to the ground. Thus, transmission, radio communications, and associated power requirements can be reduced.

With the availability of robust data processing in space, advanced technologies like autonomous operations, tipping and cueing, event detection, and artificial intelligence/machine learning (AI/ML) technologies are envisioned. Each of these technologies provides added flexibility and mission resiliency, but all are enabled by the ability to analyze large amounts of data as close to the sensor as possible.

To complement the robust onboard processing capability described above, multi-path and adaptive secure communications are required. Coordinated data collection and observational events require certain sets of engineering information and data—for example, timing and relative location of sensor platforms, as in a swarm or constellation—to be shared within the greater space-based network. Similarly, as different elements of the various heterogeneous systems need to interact, specific data sets are required to be distributed and exchanged with these

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¹ See J. Olson, S. Butow, E. Felt, T. Cooley, and J. Mozer, 2021, State of the Space Industrial Base 2021: Infrastructure and Services for Economic Growth and National Security, November, https://assets.ctfassets.net/3nanhbfkr0pc/43TeQTAmdYrym5DTDrhjd3/a37eb4fac2bf9add1ab9f71299392043/Space_Industrial_Base_Workshop_2021_Summary_Report_-_Final_15_Nov_2021c.pdf.

external networks. Passing information across system interfaces will naturally require a collection of standards and protocols in order to efficiently move information through HSA and eventually to the end user. The adoption of a set of standards that enables this cross-platform exchange and coordination will also facilitate the seamless addition of novel assets or systems or the deletion of obsolete nodes and elements.

A NEW ECOSYSTEM ENABLED BY HSA

Evolution of technical capabilities is rarely static; improvements, increased efficiencies, and novel ways of achieving mission goals are continuously developing. However, exactly how this evolution occurs is not entirely predictable. Much of the early research is still trial and error and requires specific results as a demonstration of performance and acceptability.

S&T/R&D practitioners who experiment and test to evaluate and explore novel technologies are the most fundamental type of users. A second type of user is the one that transitions from the more basic S&T/R&D to the operational user. Here, the system is tested further under varying conditions and environments and is upgraded for integration and adoption by operational users. The operational user requires a stable, reliable, and robust set of capabilities to meet mission needs.

As illustrated in Table 3.1 below, in this new architecture, the operational user sits on top, using mission-directed space assets, which collect timely and important data. The next layer consists of test and integration users using assets supporting the development of systems potentially transitioning to the operational level in the future. These users are evaluating systems that may significantly add to the data base collected by the operational users. The lowest level consists of S&T/R&D users developing and testing technology in the exploratory and discovery phases of the information. All users will benefit from HSA, with S&T/R&D users able to more rapidly respond to changing national priorities by leveraging the existing architecture. Table 3.1 also depicts two important factors: (1) operational users require high reliability and risk avoidance—naturally, these systems inherently come at a higher cost, and have a low pace of change; and (2) S&T/R&D users work to keep pace with advancing technologies in support of national priorities—their pace of change is much higher than operational systems.

As depicted in Table 3.1, reliability and risk avoidance for DoD operational users are much higher than for S&T/R&D users, but pace-of-change of technology insertion is the opposite. S&T/R&D users are interested in the creation of new or novel capabilities, and therefore, consider such capabilities as test articles or laboratories. While the outcome of these tests is intended to inform and migrate up the technology readiness level ladder toward an operational capability, they are not always predictable.

Test and integration users mature the immature technology and adapt or modify it to be compatible with the operational mission. Operational users, on the other hand, demand technological stability, predictability, and a higher pace of change (e.g., adaptability and flexibility of systems), in order to meet mission objectives. A system can be considered operational when sufficient testing has been completed to demonstrate an appropriate level of reliability. To satisfy a capability requirement, users of future space architectures will need to be able to take advan-

TABLE 3.1 HSA User Hierarchy

NOTES: Three primary DoD user categories are shown that all reap benefits of an HSA. One end of the spectrum shows space assets supporting operational users, typically driven to high reliability systems with risk avoidance. This combination almost always drives cost upward. Because DoD operational systems are typically required to be very mature before fielding, the technological pace of change can oftentimes be slow. The opposite end of the spectrum pertains to S&T/R&D users who are typically developing one-off systems with lower reliability. These technology systems can typically tolerate more risk, and are typically less costly than highly mature systems. Because these systems are not being developed for DoD operational fielding, these less mature systems can advance technology at a much more rapid pace.

tage of the following resources: (1) traditional satellites; (2) SmallSats; (3) various launch services (rideshare and dedicated); (4) hosted payloads on government or commercial satellites; and (5) commercial data services. From a national security space system perspective, each of these resource options supports user needs, but individually they are only part of a possible larger ecosystem. For example, the systems-orientated approach provided by the HSA is necessary to develop on-orbit capability to increase the information opportunities to users whether that information is data or a service.

Through its multi-system integration, the HSA shows great promise in benefiting critical government national missions, while at the same time providing broader opportunities for S&T/R&D teams to inject innovations at a more rapid pace, ensuring new technologies and sensor phenomenologies can be brought to bear as they mature. Technology developers need not tackle the creation of needed infrastructure required to field a given technology. As an example, if a company is developing an innovative sensor to test, they can leverage the production of space vehicles, and the common communications architecture being developed with the HSA to rapidly field their sensor and enable their investment to focus on their payload, rather than having to fund and develop the entire effort. This allows the technology development efforts to be more efficiently focused on the improvements of that capability. In addition, there are increasing opportunities to take advantage of commercial satellites to host government-developed payloads—decreasing cost and increasing overall system resilience. This enterprise integration of national, allied, and commercial systems will result in efficiencies and operational synergies beneficial to all government users.

Benefit of HSA to Traditional Users

Below are examples of legacy space systems users that can benefit from the new capabilities afforded by HSA:

• U.S. Strategic Commanders: May utilize proliferated SmallSats with higher revisit rates that have a better chance of being in the right place at the right time to make data collections. Commanders will also benefit from the possibility of sharing unclassified commercial data to communicate the gravity of national or international issues and emergencies with the government, allies, and adversaries.
• U.S. Intelligence Community: May exploit higher revisit rates, allowing it to inform intelligence based on change detection. Adversaries in previous times could deny or deceive U.S. understanding of their capabilities and actions by hiding them during times when intelligence assets were overhead. With HSA, this deny/deceive approach becomes more challenging, as the gaps between the government-only systems (government, allied, and commercial) are dramatically reduced. Furthermore, information operators, such as those charged with influencing adversary perceptions and actions before and during a conflict, will also benefit from the ability to use unclassified commercial space products.
• U.S. Strategic Forces: May benefit from the improved resilience, deterrence, and stability that comes from constellations with more breadth and depth than the current highly vulnerable, highly concentrated architecture.

The inherently more affordable SmallSats and small launchers being developed by the New Space community will make holding space assets in strategic reserve much more practical. In the cases of air, sea, or ground warfare, the military ensures that its force structure has additional assets to fill gaps caused by attrition or to surge capability to create decisive effects. The distributed nature of the HSA allows it to be incrementally updated with new technologies and capabilities as they mature.

Opportunities for Nontraditional Users

With an HSA, rapid access to space may be a future option for many government users who were excluded from participation owing to the cost associated with developing and fielding space capabilities. They range from tactical operators to the S&T/R&D community and may have specific data requirements, sensor designs, or even prototypes they would like to launch on short timelines. For those users traditionally underserved by current space assets, the HSA will be a major step forward. Some of these users include:

• U.S. Tactical Military Forces: These forces have traditionally relied on surface or airborne platforms for tactical intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and command and control. The HSA will provide many new opportunities in support of ISR, command and control, positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT); weather; missile warning; and tracking missions. Space systems show promise in providing high-bandwidth information access to move ISR and other data rapidly to mobile forces. Reducing information latency is critical to tactical forces, as they conduct high-tempo operations. Starlink, Project Kuiper, and OneWeb are current examples of existing or planned commercial services capable of providing low-latency high-bandwidth (i.e., 100 megabits) communication capabilities for both consumer and military users. SpaceX has already launched over 1,600 low Earth orbit (LEO) SmallSats, with a constellation able to provide individual users with such high-bandwidth communications.
• DoD and Intelligence Community Scientists: This new architectural approach will enhance scientific study of military operating locations, including ocean and coastal areas.
• Military Logistics: The U.S. military is constantly moving large volumes of materiel to support its global operations and would benefit greatly from the fine tracking capability that could come from employing Internet of Things (IoT) services based on satellite technology. New Space companies are working to deploy and operate constellations of IoT-related satellites. Swarm² is an example of this type of technology. Such an approach offers the potential to further improve military logistical capabilities.

EVOLVING HSA FOR A BROAD SPECTRUM OF USERS

Technical Challenges

HSA could be the basis of a national space ecosystem servicing not only top-level military users, but a broad spectrum of other users, including those in DoD, civilian agencies, universities, and private industry. The primary challenges of HSA are the complexity inherent in this type of architecture, because it requires a variable trust framework and the ability to perform data fusion and network automation. Until recently, there were not enough sources to pursue this type of approach in space.

There are many architectural elements involved, starting with the on-orbit sensors and stretching all the way through the network and communications layers through analytical engines to the ground and ultimately the end user. In order to enable and grow all of the various elements of such an ecosystem, efficiencies and economies of scale need to also be exploited. Rapid development approaches as well as advanced design and manufacturing techniques, such as model-based design and testing, additive manufacturing, digital engineering, and agile software development methods will be required. Furthermore, owing to the large number of elements within the architecture that will be required to be interoperable and integrated, standards and common interfaces will be essential to allow the various elements to work together effectively.

For data management needs within the ground segment, advanced secure cloud-based services will be essential to the synthesis of disparate data streams and the associated analysis and routing of large amounts of data. These technologies are developing sufficiently in the commercial sectors for the capabilities needed to create a robust HSA, but custom algorithms, standard interfaces, and unique applications will certainly be required to achieve a successful overall architecture.

The deployment and maintenance of the various elements of HSA will also require a timely, robust launch capability. Fielding of new sensor packages with advanced capabilities obviously relies on the ability to place these new nodes into the appropriate operational space environment. Furthermore, as on-orbit assets fail or become obsolete, replacement spacecraft will be required to be launched and deployed. Because neither of these scenarios have predictable timelines, the ability to launch on demand becomes critical. Significant launch delays could result in diminished coverage or capabilities. However, in contrast to traditional single sensor packages, marginal losses of nodes in HSA can be overcome with the redeployment or retasking of other deployed elements. Ultimately,

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² For more information, see the SWARM website at https://swarm.space.

the ability to rapidly launch and replenish on-orbit assets introduces a key element of flexibility and agility and provides HSA with the ability to quickly react to changing or unanticipated scenarios.

Partnership Challenges

HSA as a driver of a New Space ecosystem could shift the paradigm for a broad spectrum of traditional and nontraditional users. At the heart of HSA is the ability to aggregate sources of information at different trust levels. Because of the rapid growth of unclassified, space-based information sources from commercial partners (U.S. and allied), there are many ways to ingest these products at varying trust levels to benefit both military and civilian missions. In some cases, they may merely highlight where a higher trusted source might look, or in other cases, they may ingest data from global science monitoring campaigns. Data and information aggregation can happen using multiple sensors across the full trust spectrum. Not all sensors would be required for the same action, but they can inform decision-making based off the trust of the platform.

The ecosystem could change the paradigm for a broad spectrum of current and New Space users. To achieve this potential, however, these individuals/agencies will need to form new and strong relationships and partnerships with the commercial space industry. For traditional users, this will require a significant culture shift. DoD and the intelligence community (IC), in particular, are used to partnering with traditional large defense contractors to build and field specialized capabilities.

Another challenge for new users is that many do not have the knowledge and understanding of what it takes to field capabilities and operate in space that has typically been in the domain of traditional space. These new users will need to learn how to field a space-based capability and to develop the partnerships necessary to achieve their goals, or find commercial partners that can supply all or part of the necessary components. Today, there is no “one-stop shop” option for access to space. Chapter 5 discusses some approaches to make access to New Space capabilities easier in the future.

Aggregated stovepipe investments for traditional space have been shown to be more expensive than pivoting to the solutions offer by HSA. These new approaches offer the potential to reduce costs, increase access, and add resiliency, but they will require a willingness to partner with new providers and explore new approaches to providing the needed capabilities. The HSA approach is not precluded by current acquisition rules; however, there will be cultural challenges. Trust in new partners, the ability to experiment with new approaches, the willingness to be flexible, and a greater acceptance of risk will be required to take advantage of the New Space community as it rapidly evolves.

HSA can lay the foundation to support government and commercial partnerships in a manner that will enable solutions to the challenges laid out above. HSA will leverage advances coming from both the public sector and private industry, while creating underlying standards that would aid new entrants into this field by reducing the required amount of infrastructure. A successful HSA will provide well-validated solutions to common mission development and operational challenges, as well as a community of experts who can enable a long-term and sustainable ecosystem spanning civil, intelligence, and defense interests. Commercial organizations need to realize the benefits of the HSA, as it will define a common architecture into which they can design and produce products across broad agency areas of common interest. Because no one entity will have the ability to develop and maintain HSA, partnerships will have to be formed, and agreements produced, to direct and sustain its usage, but given the scale and complexity of its objectives, it will necessarily rely upon the government and its resources.

GOVERNMENT AS ANCHOR TENANT FOR THE NEW ECOSYSTEM

For a broad spectrum of users to take full advantage of the capabilities that the new ecosystem offers, commercial companies will need government investments and sponsorship to grow what is currently a small wedge of business. While the commercial space industry is enjoying considerable private investment today, it will need reliable customers for the long term. The government will need to be one of the key customers of the capabilities offered by the envisioned space ecosystem. With government support, New Space companies can continue to flourish through PPPs, ensuring that the United States will maintain a lead in the commercial space economy. It

will ensure that critically important government needs are met through cost-effective and resilient architectures of the New Space ecosystem and that the entire spectrum of users is able to access the capabilities provided by space systems.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION

CONCLUSION: The Hybrid Space Architecture (HSA) shows great potential as a framework for a new space ecosystem integrating timely, traditional, and New Space industries to deliver cost-effective and flexible space capabilities in support of a broad array of national missions and objectives. This ecosystem could enable the Office of Naval Research to pursue both its technology demonstration initiative and its long-term applications.

RECOMMENDATION: The Office of Naval Research (ONR) should consider the Hybrid Space Architecture framework as an opportunity to fulfill its long-term ocean science objectives. ONR should work with the U.S. Space Force to tailor its HSA-based approach to serve as a pilot program for other U.S. government and nongovernment users.³

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³ This recommendation was edited after release to the sponsor to direct it to ONR rather than the broader National Oceanographic Partnership Program. This clarifies that the recommendation is aimed at enabling ONR’s long-term ocean science objectives.