COLORADO SPRINGS — Boeing is aligning its satellite operations more closely with subsidiary Millennium Space Systems as it moves to compete with a new generation of lower-cost suppliers reshaping the defense space market.
The company announced April 16 it has developed a mid-sized, or “micro GEO,” satellite platform for military and commercial customers that combines Boeing’s payload technology with Millennium’s faster production model.
Executives described the effort as part of a broader push to capture demand for smaller and lower-cost satellites and speed up delivery timelines — areas where venture-backed startups have gained traction with the Pentagon by offering satellites on shorter schedules and at lower price points than traditional defense contractors.
“We have a startup mentality with Millennium, but with the resources and heritage of a prime and we don’t have to make a choice between heritage and agility,” said Kay Sears, vice president and general manager of Boeing Space, Intelligence & Weapons Systems.
Sears and Tony Gingiss, chief executive of Millennium Space, spoke with reporters on the sidelines of the Space Symposium.
Millennium Space Systems was founded in 2001 in Southern California as a builder of small satellites for government and commercial customers, carving out a niche in lower-cost, faster-turnaround spacecraft at a time when most defense primes were focused on larger, bespoke systems.
The company steadily expanded its footprint in national security space programs, supplying smallsat buses and mission solutions to the Pentagon. Boeing acquired Millennium in 2018 and has since operated it as a largely independent subsidiary, using it as a vehicle to bring more agile manufacturing practices into its satellite business while preserving Millennium’s faster production cadence and smallsat-focused culture.
“We’re aligning our space business to meet a market that is moving faster and asking for more flexibility,” said Sears.
100 satellite backlog
Gingiss said the company intends to continue to focus on small satellites, with 100 spacecraft in its backlog. At the same time, Millennium is now venturing into a mid-class satellite platform co-developed with its parent company.
The new bus, called Resolute, is aimed at missions that need more capability than a traditional small satellite can provide, but that can be produced faster than a typical large satellite program. Boeing said the platform is multi-orbit, but it is expected to compete in the emerging “micro GEO” market for space-based communications and sensing.
Micro GEO is industry shorthand for geostationary satellites that are smaller and cheaper than traditional GEO platforms, an approach that has gained traction as manufacturers push GEO architectures toward smallsat economics using more compact payloads.
Gingiss said the effort emerged from a gap between the two companies’ product lines. Millennium’s satellites typically operate in the roughly 50-watt to about one- to one-and-a-half-kilowatt range, while Boeing’s platforms start at about four kilowatts and extend to more than 30 kilowatts for its largest systems.
“And there was kind of a spot in the middle, right in the two to four kilowatt range” market gap that the company sees as an opportunity, he said.
“Resolute allows us to kind of fill that hole, use all the same common products, no new product development from avionics or power subsystems,” Gingiss said. “And I think it’s a perfect example of how the subsidiary and the larger company work together.”
The company is beginning to market the platform and is “looking for the right launch customer,” Gingiss said, declining to say whether it is being offered to the U.S. Space Force for upcoming procurements of geostationary surveillance satellites.
Industrywide, micro GEO satellites are being positioned as a way for countries to field sovereign space capabilities without the cost and complexity of traditional GEO programs. Governments that have historically leased satellite capacity can instead deploy smaller, dedicated spacecraft to cover their own territory, for both commercial communications and military use.
That would be one of the use cases for the Resolute class, Gingiss said. “Individual countries want satellites that can be commercial and military, whether it’s Ku band or Ka band.”
Sears said the same demand is emerging across multiple regions. “A number of countries want comm and they want comm over their country, and then the military wants comm as well. So it serves two markets for them,” she said.
For Millennium, the move represents an expansion rather than a shift away from its core business.
“The majority of our business is going to be where we are today. But this allows us to plant those seeds,” Gingiss said. “Who knows? It may grow into a nice fraction of our business.”