Lockheed awarded GPS upgrade contract

The Air Force on Feb. 4 awarded Lockheed Martin a $96 million contract to make crucial modifications to the existing Global Positioning System ground station that will allow it to operate next-generation satellites despite the expected late delivery of follow-on ground infrastructure.

The service announced in December that the new ground station -- dubbed GPS OCX and built by Raytheon -- will be at least two years late. Inside Defense reported last week that key software needed to support initial operations of new GPS III satellites will not be online until September 2017, nearly a year after Lockheed's first GPS III satellite is planned to be ready for launch.

The service has been working on a mitigation strategy for this, and this week's contract announcement should help address concerns about early GPS III launch and operations.

"[The] contractor will provide Global Positioning System III contingency operations services and supplies to modify the current GPS control segment to operate all GPS III satellites that are launched prior to the transition to the Next-Generation Operational Control System," the contract announcement states. "Furthermore, this action will buy GPS III satellite vehicle simulation modules, GPS simulator, and updates to the GPS positional training emulator."

The service awarded the funds as a modification to an existing contract.

In other GPS news, the service launched its 12th -- and final -- GPS IIF satellite Friday from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FL, at 8:38 a.m. The Boeing-built satellite rounds out the GPS II constellation, which has included 72 space vehicles since 1978.