Ships from the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force , Republic of Korea Navy, and US Navy Carrier Strike Group (CSG) 1, sail together during a trilateral exercise, Jan. 16, 2024. The exercise allowed maritime forces forces to jointly to train to enhance coordination on maritime domain awareness and other shared security interests. (US Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Isaiah Williams)
WASHINGTON — The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) has picked Orbital Insight to pilot its nascent program, called Project Aegir, for buying unclassified data and analytics related to maritime domain awareness — in the embattled agency’s latest move to speed intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) products to users, especially ever-more demanding US military operators.
While small, the contract represents the first use of a new NGA procurement tool, called the Commercial Solutions Opening (CSO), aimed at speeding acquisition of commercial ISR writ large at a time when the agency is locked in a fight with the Space Force and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) about their respective authorities to buy “tactical” imagery and analysis from private satellite operators.
“NGA’s first CSO used a new acquisition authority to increase the speed of procurements by bringing together mission experts in a streamlined evaluation process,” Devin Brande, NGA’s head of commercial operations, said in the agency’s July 24 announcement.
The NGA release bragged that the “entire CSO solicitation, from public announcement to selection, occurred in under 90 days.”
Under Project Aegir (Aegir is the anglicized version of the Old Norse word for sea), Orbital Insight will be eligible for up to $2 million over the next five months, the announcement explained, during which “pilot testing will be conducted on Orbital Insight’s proposed solution and capabilities, the results of which will determine any long-term contracts or broader acquisition efforts.”
The California-based company, bought in May by space situational awareness startup Privateer, integrates imagery gathered by multiple platforms ranging from radar satellites to camera-carrying drones to cell phone towers broadcasting geolocation data.
Project Aegir is specifically focused on “identifying, monitoring and tracking illicit maritime vessel activity in the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command area of responsibility,” the NGA announcement noted.
“We challenged the commercial industry to show us the most innovative solutions to address hard problems in the Indo-Pacific theater,” Brand said.
The Defense Department has been increasingly worried about Chinese military activity in the South China Sea, but also the potential risk of conflict stemming from things like illegal fishing and piracy in the region — in particular the rise of violent robberies of ships in the Gulf of Aden by Somali pirates.
