TrustPoint is moving forward to build out its GPS-independent PNT constellation plans, tapping EnduroSat US to build 40 satellites in a deal announced Thursday.
These 40 satellites will take the company’s constellation to 47 satellites, including three previously launched spacecraft and four spacecraft in development as part of a SpaceWERX Tactical Funding Increase (TACFI) awarded earlier this year.
“It’s a signal that we’re transitioning out of the R&D demo and pilot timeframe into the operational, production timeframe. That’s the transition Trust Point will be going through in 2027,” CEO and founder Patrick Shannon told Via Satellite.
The constellation will fly a C-band GNSS payload to provide resilient, precision positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) that is independent of GPS and does not operate in L-band. TrustPoint has completed a number of milestones with its satellites in-orbit including transmitting and receiving C-band GNSS signal and the first C-band ground-to-space PNT demonstration.
As GNSS interference is on the rise, Shannon says the company has “tremendous” unsolicited inbound from international organizations and governments looking to leverage C-band for navigation, as well as the company’s contracts with the U.S. government.
Shannon expects electronic warfare to have increasing impact to and to civilian applications like food delivery, emergency services, maritime trade, and commercial aviation.
“Electronic warfare is here to stay. It’s not going anywhere, and it doesn’t just affect the warfighter. Jamming and spoofing do not respect boundaries,” he said. “They do not respect whether you’re a warfighter or a civilian, and there are tens if not hundreds of millions of people across Europe and hundreds of millions of people across the Middle East that are daily or weekly impacted by electronic warfare. Those numbers will skyrocket as things heat up in the Asian Pacific.”
The company builds the payload in-house in its facility in Herndon, Virginia. EnduroSat will integrate the payloads into its bus in its U.S. facility in Denver. EnduroSat US is a subsidiary of the satellite manufacturer based in Bulgaria.
The 40 satellites announced on Thursday are set to be deployed in a series of three tranches, with an initial small tranche launched in 2027, Shannon said.
The company has one launch slot booked and another in negotiation. The satellites are not technically cubesats, but are in the range of 8 kg to 9 kg and can be accommodate in many different launch situations to give the company flexibility, Shannon said.
He added that TrustPoint plans to double its order for successive build-outs of the constellation, potentially looking at 80, then 160 more satellites. 40 satellites is not enough coverage to provide 24/7 PNT capability but will provide capability for long-form testing and minimal operations, he said.
“There are a lot of assets out there, infrastructure that use GPS-like services for time [including] 5G networks, data centers, power grids, financial networks. Having a couple of time hacks every day can be very valuable to some of those use cases,” Shannon said. “We’ll start with folks that are either regionally focused or temporally flexible, and then as we grow the constellation past the 40, we’ll start bringing in more and more user groups.”
Shannon says EnduroSat was selected after a comprehensive RFP process where EnduroSat’s organizational focus on mass manufacturing stood out.
“We actually qualified multiple vendors for the 40-satellite build, and down-selected to EnduroSat due to their growing U.S. presence. U.S. manufacturing is very important to us in the long-term,” Shannon said, also pointing out the company’s “flight heritage and posture and forward-looking vision as it comes to manufacturing at scale.”
TrustPoint won the Startup Space competition during SATShow Week in 2024, and Shannon appeared on the On Orbit podcast afterwards to detail the company’s vision.
