WASHINGTON — The U.S. Space Force awarded BAE Systems an $11.8 million contract to display satellite-to-satellite communications the usage of Hyperlink-182, a radio-frequency knowledge hyperlink usual followed for its deliberate MILNET knowledge relay community supporting the Golden Dome missile protection defend.

The award, introduced April 28 through Space Systems Command, follows a separate $57 million contract to SpaceX for the “Hyperlink-182 Space-to-Space Comms Gadget Construction and Demonstration.” The command stated it won six proposals. The BAE demonstration is scheduled for finishing touch through April 2027.

Hyperlink-182 is meant to allow direct verbal exchange between satellites in orbit, decreasing reliance on flooring stations. Below the idea that, space-based interceptors would use Hyperlink-182 radios to attach into the MILNET relay layer and go knowledge throughout satellites, permitting sooner and extra resilient knowledge sharing in missile monitoring and reaction situations.

Golden Dome, a proposed U.S. missile protection structure, envisions a community of satellites that comes with space-based interceptors designed to locate and break missiles in a while after release. A key part of that device is MILNET, a deliberate constellation of Starshield communications satellites in low Earth orbit constructed through SpaceX and operated through the Space Force. MILNET is predicted to function the communications spine, linking interceptors with different satellites and command techniques.

The Space Force is looking for compact radios able to working with Hyperlink-182 in L- and S-band frequencies.