A NASA relay takes flight: Maxwell will test how tomorrow's spacecraft phone home

NASA's old relay satellites are retiring, and commercial partners are auditioning to replace them. Viasat's Maxwell spacecraft — built by Rocket Lab — lifted off from Cape Canaveral on October 20 aboard SpaceX's Bandwagon-5 mission, and will spend five months demonstrating real-time relay services under NASA contracts worth $81 million. The idea is simple and transformative: spacecraft in low Earth orbit shouldn't have to wait for a ground station to pass overhead to send their data home. Continuous contact means faster science, safer missions, and pictures of Earth that arrive while they still matter.

SDG 9 · Industry, innovation and infrastructure — Mechanism: tech innovation