Photo: Geost

Rocket Lab has signed an agreement to acquire payload developer Geost, LLC in a bid to enter the satellite payload market and strengthen its national security space solutions. 

Rocket Lab announced the deal on May 27 to acquire the parent holding company of Geost from Lightridge Solutions, a portfolio company of ATL Partners, for $275 million. The deal consists of $125 million in cash, $150 million in privately placed shares of Rocket Lab common stock, plus up to $50 million potential additional payments tied to revenue. 

Geost’s offerings include electro-optical (EO) and infrared (IR) sensor systems for missile warning and tracking, tactical intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, Earth observation, and space domain awareness. 

“With this deal, Rocket Lab will officially enter the payload market as a disruptive prime contractor to U.S. national security,” Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck told investors in a Tuesday call. “The acquisition of Geost will bring on board critical technology and payloads that are relied upon by the Department of Defense for missile warning and tracking, tactical intelligence and surveillance and reconnaissance, as well as Earth observation and space domain awareness.”

Beck added that the acquisition sets Rocket Lab up “to deliver the complete stack of mission critical hardware for U.S. national security missions.”

Rocket Lab’s rationale for the deal includes going after the “Golden Dome” missile defense architecture, and the release said this acquisition brings in “core capabilities for achieving the U.S. Department of Defense’s goals for resilient, proliferated space architectures, like the proposed Golden Dome architecture and the Space Development Agency’s Tracking Layer.”

Rocket Lab CFO Adam Spice said near-term opportunities include the Space Development Agency’s Tranche 3 procurement for more than 50 missile tracking and missile defense satellites. Rocket Lab is a contractor on the SDA Tranche 2 Transport Layer.

Geost is based in Tucson, Arizona, and has facilities in Northern Virginia as well. Rocket Lab said that 115 Geost employees will join Rocket Lab, post-close.

The deal is subject to closing conditions and is expected to close in the second half of 2025.

Geost’s company’s portfolio also includes laser communication terminals and autonomous optical ground stations. Rocket Lab is also going through a deal to acquire German laser terminal manufacturer Mynaric. Beck recently said that Mynaric will remain a merchant supplier of laser terminals to the space industry, but the terminals could also serve a potential Rocket Lab constellation, which the company has been teasing in recent months.

Separately, ATL Partners said that post-acquisition, it will combine the two remaining divisions of LightRidge, Trident Systems and Ophir Corporation, to form Trident Solutions, which will focus on “mission critical electrical components, processing solutions, and airborne payloads.”