AFA Connect
Space Force Resets SCAR Around Commercial Satellite-Control Capacity
Analysis of the Space Force's SCAR reset, its three commercial satellite-control antenna models, and the capacity, cyber and mission-control tests ahead.
By Joy Glip ·
Original AFA Connect reporting. Facts are attributed to the public records and reporting listed below. Report a factual error.
Sources and records
- Space Force announces Commercial Solutions Opening strategy for Satellite Communications Augmentation Resource program — U.S. Space Force
- Satellite Control Network: Space Force's Capacity Is Limited, and Supply and Demand Are Misaligned — U.S. Government Accountability Office
- Space Force Interested in Commercial Antennas to Control Satellites — Air & Space Forces Magazine
- New Boston: The history hidden within — Defense Visual Information Distribution Service
Image: U.S. Space Force photo via DVIDS (public domain)
The U.S. Space Force is changing how it plans to add capacity to the ground network that commands and tracks government satellites. Rather than returning immediately to one purpose-built antenna design, the service is asking industry to propose commercially available systems under a Commercial Solutions Opening for the Satellite Communications Augmentation Resource program, known as SCAR.
The service announced the commercial-acquisition direction Sept. 16. Air & Space Forces Magazine subsequently reported details from a Sept. 24 notice issued with the Missile Defense Agency: the government is considering three distinct operating models, ranging from government ownership to shared commercial service. That makes the reset more than a new competition. It is a decision about which parts of satellite control the government must own, which it can reserve, and which it can buy as demand arises.
Three models, three different control arrangements
The first area of interest would use commercially derived systems that the government owns and a contractor operates. The second would rely on long-term, exclusive government leases of commercially owned and operated systems. The third is an antenna-as-a-service model in which government missions share commercial infrastructure that can also serve other customers.
Those options are not interchangeable. Government ownership can preserve more direct authority over configuration, maintenance priorities and mission scheduling, but it also brings capital and sustainment obligations. An exclusive lease can reduce the need to own the hardware while reserving capacity. A shared-service model can spread infrastructure costs across customers and make expansion faster, but it puts greater weight on enforceable priority rules, data separation, cyber incident response and compatible software interfaces.
Air & Space Forces reported that the notice itself identifies multi-tenant data leakage, scheduling conflicts and interoperability bottlenecks among the risks commercial approaches must address. Those are central mission questions, not contract fine print. A satellite-control service has to be available when a mission needs a pass, keep one customer’s data isolated from another’s and exchange commands and telemetry correctly with government systems.
Why the reset matters
The Satellite Control Network has limited capacity relative to growing demand. The Government Accountability Office reported in 2023 that the network consists of 19 globally distributed antennas, was operating at full capacity and faced likely demand growth over the following decade. GAO recommended an assessment of future capacity needs so the service could judge whether its expansion strategy would be sufficient.
The earlier SCAR approach sought 12 multibeam phased-array antennas under a contract reported at up to $1.4 billion. The Space Force canceled that deal in March, according to Air & Space Forces, as officials moved away from a Space Force-specific design and toward greater use of commercial technology. The new opening therefore tests whether industry can supply useful capacity without recreating the same ownership model under a different label.
That shift can broaden the supplier and technical pool, but commercial availability alone does not prove operational resilience. The government still has to establish how competing missions receive priority, what happens when a provider or site is unavailable, how systems are accredited and patched, and how quickly capacity can be reassigned. Geographic distribution matters, but so do scheduling authority, common interfaces and the ability to continue service through cyber or physical disruption.
What to watch next
Industry white papers are due Oct. 15, Air & Space Forces reported, after which the program office can select one or more proposals for a second phase. The opening does not yet identify winning vendors, a final architecture, an awarded value or a fielding schedule.
The most informative measures will be concrete: how much simultaneous contact capacity each model adds; what availability and restoration standards providers must meet; how tenant data is separated; whether scheduling and command interfaces work across government and commercial systems; and how the service avoids dependence on a single vendor or operating model. A mixed approach could ultimately be more useful than choosing one model for every mission, but only if the Space Force defines where shared commercial efficiency ends and sovereign mission control must begin.
SCAR’s reset is therefore best understood as a capacity-and-control experiment. The Space Force has opened the door to industry’s existing antennas and service models. The next phase must show that those offerings can deliver dependable satellite access while preserving the security, priority and operational authority national-security missions require.