New Space EconomyBusiness, Technology, and Trends

January 8, 2024 put the buried in space market into public view when Vulcan lifted memorial payloads connected to Celestis and the broader Peregrine Mission One effort. In commercial practice, “buried in space” does not mean whole-body burial off Earth. It means paid memorial services that send a symbolic portion of cremated remains, and sometimes DNA, on suborbital, orbital, lunar, or deep-space missions. That distinction matters because the market is selling ritual, symbolism, destination, and technical execution more than it is selling traditional burial in the terrestrial sense.

The U.S. Space Force’s Space Systems Command has awarded its first Commercial Solutions Opening prototype contracts under the Kronos program to MapLarge and Leidos, marking a key milestone in efforts to modernize space intelligence and secure decision advantage in an increasingly contested orbital domain. The contracts, valued at $499,828 for MapLarge and $1.43 million for Leidos, will fund the development of an integrated prototype focused on enhancing battlespace characterization, intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance operations, and multi-source data fusion across the Kronos enterprise.

On April 27, 2026, Inc. covered a new Meta energy move that links artificial intelligence (AI), space infrastructure, and electric power procurement. The Meta AI space power story centers on an agreement with Overview Energy to reserve up to 1 gigawatt (GW) of space solar capacity, with the startup’s system designed to collect solar energy in orbit and transmit it to existing solar projects on Earth as low-intensity near-infrared light.

On March 18, 2026, the U.S. Space Force announced operational acceptance for Enhanced Polar System-Recapitalization, extending protected Arctic communications into the 2030s. That decision captures the central shift in satellite services for military organizations: a single exquisite satellite no longer covers enough mission risk, geography, or traffic demand. Modern forces now split communications, sensing, and navigation support across protected geostationary systems, medium-orbit capacity, and proliferated low Earth orbit constellations that can keep functioning even after jamming, cyber pressure, or local orbital loss.

Starlink Maritime now advertises ocean access through Global Priority service, and the current Performance Kit is marketed with download capability of more than 400 Mbps. That headline figure has changed expectations, yet satellite services for yacht owners no longer fit neatly into a single purchase. Owners are usually buying four things at once: primary internet, backup communications, safety capability, and onboard network management. A boat that only needs coastal browsing can often live with a far simpler setup than a yacht crossing oceans with guests, crew payroll, remote work, and charter-grade media demand.

On April 20, 2026, the Office of the Chief Data and Artificial Intelligence Officer for the Department of the Air Force (DAF) publicly released two foundational documents: the Department of the Air Force Artificial Intelligence Strategy and the Department of the Air Force Data Strategy. These strategies, announced via an official Air Force press release, outline a unified roadmap to transform the DAF into an “AI-first force.” By treating data as the “ammunition of modern warfare” and AI as a decisive force multiplier, the DAF aims to deliver unmatched decision advantage, operational agility, and technological superiority against near-peer adversaries.

MDA Space (TSX: MDA) recorded revenues of C$499 million in 2025, a 44% year-over-year increase, with a year-end backlog of C$4.0 billion. That performance reflects the broader momentum in Canada's commercial space sector, which employs tens of thousands of workers and generated research and development (R&D) expenditures of $593 million in 2022, an 8% increase from the year prior. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) account for roughly 93% of all Canadian space companies by count, though the 30 largest organizations collectively produce approximately 94% of total sector revenues, with satellite communications representing roughly 75% of the industry's output.

Five graduate students from the University of Toronto incorporated Kepler Communications in 2015 with a single purpose: to build the internet for space. Mina Mitry, Samer Bishay, Jeffrey Osborne, Mark Michael, and Wen Cheng Chong had collaborated through the University of Toronto Aerospace Team and were intimately familiar with the bottleneck they wanted to eliminate. Most satellites can only transmit data when they pass over a ground station. For any given orbit, that means two or three contact windows per day, each lasting just a few minutes. The data collected between those windows stays locked aboard the spacecraft until the next pass.

In the quiet coastal community of Canso, Nova Scotia - home to about 1,100 residents within a five-and-a-half-kilometre radius of the proposed site - a controversial “spaceport” project has been simmering since 2016. Proponents tout it as a game-changer for Canada’s space industry and rural economy, but critics, including long-time local residents, describe it as a flawed boondoggle backed by untested technology, questionable partners, and significant taxpayer dollars.

The United States has operated a mature commercial space launch regulatory framework for over four decades, while Canada is only now establishing its first dedicated statutory regime. With the introduction of Bill C-28, the Canadian Space Launch Act on April 21, 2026, Canada is deliberately modeling key elements of its new rules on the U.S. system to accelerate development, ensure interoperability, and reduce reliance on foreign launch providers - primarily American ones. Below is a side-by-side comparison of the two frameworks as they stand in April 2026.

In a landmark move announced on April 21, 2026, the Canadian government introduced legislation that could finally give Canada its own “way to space.” Transport Minister and Government House Leader Steven MacKinnon tabled Bill C-28 in the House of Commons, formally enacting the Canadian Space Launch Act. This bill establishes Canada’s first dedicated statutory framework for regulating commercial and government space launches and re-entries from Canadian soil.

On April 1, 2026, SpaceX took the first formal step toward a public listing by submitting a confidential draft registration statement to the Securities and Exchange Commission. The move immediately positioned the company for what analysts project could become the largest initial public offering ever recorded, potentially eclipsing the thirty billion dollars raised by Saudi Aramco in 2019. With a targeted valuation approaching two trillion dollars and plans to raise as much as seventy-five billion dollars, the filing arrives at a pivotal moment for both SpaceX and the broader space economy.

NASA’s April 20, 2026 update on Artemis II arrived 10 days after Orion ended its 9-day, 1-hour, 32-minute mission in the Pacific on April 10, 2026, carrying four astronauts around the Moon and back. That timing matters because Artemis II was never going to be judged only by launch and splashdown. Its real purpose was to expose the full system to a crewed lunar mission and then determine what held up, what degraded, and what must be corrected before the next steps.

Rahul Goel first tried to start a rocket company in 2016, the year he graduated from the University of Toronto's Engineering Science program with a major in aerospace engineering. Investors weren't ready to back a recent graduate pitching liquid-fuelled rockets, and the idea went on hold. What Goel did instead was build PheedLoop, a conference management software platform, and use its revenues over several years to accumulate the personal capital he'd need to try again. When he officially incorporated NordSpace in 2022, he did it in Markham, Ontario, without venture capital, without outside board pressure, and without compromising on his original vision: to build a complete, sovereign Canadian space launch system from the ground up.

On April 21, 2026, the U.S. Space Force launched GPS III SV10, the last satellite in the GPS III baseline. Four days earlier, the service had cancelled the Operational Control Segment program known as OCX after years of delay, cost growth, and testing trouble. That pairing says more about the history of the Global Positioning System (GPS) than any slogan could. The space segment kept improving. The hardest part of the upgrade moved to software, integration, cyber defense, and command authority on the ground.