BlackSky's planned AROS wide-area surveillance satellites will tip and cue its Gen-3 birds designed for rapid revisit. (Image: BlackSky)
WASHINGTON ― The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) has topped up its existing contract with BlackSky Technologies to help speed the development of new wide-area imagery satellites designed to support AI-driven target detection and analytics, according to agency and company officials.
In an announcement today, BlackSky said that the funding injection will “accelerate the development of the company’s AROS broad area collection satellites” to enable the provision of “a flight-ready multi-spectral, large-area mapping spacecraft and foundation data collection system in 2028.”
While NRO rarely releases contract values since its budget is classified, an agency spokesperson told Breaking Defense that the modification to BlackSky’s 2022 contract is for “an 8-figure amount to bring the total contract value to over $150 [million].”
Blacksky initiated self-funded development of AROS in 2023, and originally had hoped to launch AROS by 2027. Asked about the delay, a company spokesperson responded:
