SATELLITE 2026 — The Space Force intends to begin issuing first contracts next month for its new(ish) Kronos project designed to modernize its operational command and control (C2) and battle management software for space domain awareness, according to a spokesperson for Space Systems Command (SSC).
Planning for Kronos was quietly initiated last May, when SSC revamped its Space Command and Control program — separating Kronos out into a separate effort to run alongside the long-troubled Advanced Tracking and Launch Analysis System (ATLAS) project, which is meant to modernize the software used to manage and process data from the Space Surveillance Network of radars and telescopes used to monitor the heavens.
ATLAS is aimed at providing the baseline capabilities needed to replace the dysfunctional 1980s-era computer system called the Space Defense Operations Center (SPADOC).
“The Kronos family of systems is focused on operational command, control, and space battle management, which is fundamentally different from the Atlas family of systems. While both originated from the same legacy program, they were intentionally divided to support distinct mission areas,” the SSC spokesperson explained in an email.
SSC issued a first Commercial Solutions Opening solicitation last November, and held an industry day March 3 to talk about its areas of interest under Kronos, including: “Operational Command and Control” to support mission planning; “Battle Management” to “orchestrate” the use of space domain awareness sensors, deconfliction and tasking; and “Space Intelligence Integration.”
Those areas of interest differ from the projects three “lines of effort,” described in the March 16 annual report by the Director of the Office of Test & Evaluation (DOT&E), as theater support software, space defense software, and infrastructure and data requirements.
The next step is to begin issuing awards using Other Transaction Authority (OTA) contract vehicles for the three “lines of effort,” the spokesperson said.
“We intend to award Other Transactions in a staggered fashion, starting in the first week of April and continuing each month thereafter for the other two lines of effort. This is just the initial prototyping effort; moving forward, we will reopen the Commercial Solutions Opening (CSO) and look to award OTAs on a regular cadence to continue building capabilities across the three lines of effort,” the SSC spokesperson said.
Meanwhile, according to the DOT&E report, ATLAS is still struggling to reach a minimum capability to allow SPADOC to be commissioned, despite the Space Force’s move to accept it as “operational” last September.
“ATLAS, as tested, did not contain the minimum viable capability necessary for SPADOC decommissioning. Testing also revealed deficiencies consistent with system immaturity,” the March report found.
The SSC spokesperson said, however, that SPADOC is not being used “operationally” today, and that “the decommission plan is in the works.”
The ATLAS project, initiated in 2018 was designed as part of a larger Space Force effort to replace and improve upon the infamously flawed Joint Space Operations Center (JSpOC) Mission System (JMS). The JMS program began in 2009 to replace SPADOC, but after a decade of effort and not quite $1 billion in spending it was killed in 2018.
L3Harris is the prime contractor for ATLAS, although the Space Force itself is serving as systems integrator. The Space Force originally planned for ATLAS to become operational in 2022, but the program has been bedeviled by technical issues and schedule delays — to the point where then-Air Force Space Acquisition Executive Frank Calvelli in 2023 dubbed it one of the Space Force’s three most troubled programs.
