Lt. Gen. John Thompson, commander of the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center, said the service branch is in the process of assessing plans that were submitted in response to a solicitation for the second phase of the National Security Space Launch program, Bloomberg reported Monday.
Thompson said the vendors competing for NSSL phase 2 have proposed rockets with “viable technologies†and are “on track to meet our requirements.â€
Northrop Grumman, SpaceX, United Launch Alliance and Blue Origin are the four companies vying for a program to launch national security payloads through 2027. The service branch plans to select two launch service providers by mid-June.
Thompson stated that the military branch is examining the use of reusable rocket boosters. “So reusabilility is just one way to change the return-on-investment for the vendor and be able to price a little bit differently in a competition,” he said.