BAE Systems Space & Mission Systems Inc.

BAE Systems Space & Mission Systems Inc., a foreign-owned subsidiary of BAE Systems, Inc., delivers space systems engineering, satellite instrument development, antenna design and manufacturing, and advanced research and development services to the federal government as a prime contractor on 81% of recent awards. The division competes full-and-open across all contract vehicles with no set-aside posture, drawing on its parent company's aerospace and defense heritage to serve 65 distinct federal agencies.

BAE Systems Space & Mission Systems operates from Broomfield, Colorado and Boulder, Colorado as a prime contractor anchoring major space and Earth observation programs. Representative prime work includes a $458.9 million cost-plus-award-fee contract with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for the Geostationary Extended Observations (GeoXO) Ocean Color (OCX) instrument design, fabrication, integration, and test through November 2049; a $549.9 million cost-plus-award-fee contract with NOAA for the GeoXO Sounder instrument covering the full lifecycle through October 2050; a $230.6 million firm fixed price delivery order under NASA's Rapid Spacecraft Acquisition IV (RAPID IV) IDIQ for the Space Weather Next Lagrange Series spacecraft bus, integration, test, launch support, and mission operations through February 2035; and a $1,225 million Other Transaction Agreement with the Space and Missile Systems Center for Resilient Missile Warning and Missile Tracking Medium Earth Orbit Epoch 2 space vehicles through January 2036, with Honeywell International Aerospace-Glendale as a major subcontractor for hardware.

Customer concentration sits heavily with NASA and the Department of Defense. NASA's Goddard Space Center leads by potential value (67 awards, $13.73 billion combined), followed by NOAA (19 awards, $10.42 billion), and the Space and Missile Systems Center (18 awards, $3.35 billion). The Department of the Air Force and Air Force sub-offices account for 309 of 996 total awards (31%) — the Air Force leads by award count at 153 awards valued at $2.07 billion combined, with the Air Force Research Laboratory at 70 awards and $1.01 billion combined potential value. This distribution reflects deep entrenchment in space systems development for civilian science missions and space-domain awareness for defense, with secondary exposure to aircraft-mounted systems and sustainment through Air Force Sustainment Center delivery orders.

Parent vehicle position shows broad platform access. The top five parent vehicles carry 188 task orders combined: Basic Ordering Agreement FA862021G4027 (55 task orders), Indefinite Delivery Contract F4162199D7700 (49 task orders), IDC F3360001D1017 (43 task orders, $9.2 million combined value), IDC FA852224D0004 (21 task orders), and IDC F2960100D0010 (19 task orders). Additional significant vehicles include GSA's OASIS+ Unrestricted multiple-award IDIQ (awarded April 15, 2025, no dollar ceiling specified in source), the Missile Defense Agency's Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layered Defense (SHIELD) multiple-award IDIQ ($151 billion ceiling, awarded December 29, 2025), NOAA's PROTECH 2.0 IDIQ ($8 billion ceiling, awarded September 1, 2026 for satellite environmental monitoring data), and Space and Missile Systems Center's Space Domain Awareness multiple-award IDIQ ($1.843 billion ceiling, awarded April 8, 2026).

Activity has grown year over year through 2024 — from 44 awards in 2022 to 81 in 2024 — then moderated to 78 in 2025 and 23 year-to-date in 2026. Forty awards with combined potential value of $772.8 million face ultimate completion inside the next twenty-four months, exposing significant recompete liability across NOAA GeoXO variants, NASA RAPID IV spacecraft studies, and Air Force sustainment work.

As a subcontractor, BAE Systems Space & Mission Systems operates across diverse primes. The division performs electronic assembly manufacturing and repair work under Northrop Grumman (LAIRCM AAQ-24 repairs), optical instrument and lens manufacturing under L3Harris Technologies Integrated Systems (RC-135 sustainment, BIG SAFARI), missile antenna and pedestal work under Raytheon and Lockheed Martin (AMRAAM, PRSM, Precision Strike Missile), and spacecraft component support under Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and others. Recent examples include subcontract work to Northrop Grumman for printed circuit assembly manufacturing in support of LAIRCM AAQ-24 repairs (recurring from January 2025 through October 2025), work to L3Harris for optical components supporting RC-135 sustainment (February through December 2024), and antenna subsystem components to L3Harris Interstate Electronics for flight test instrumentation programs (April 2024 through August 2025).

SCI-reported service contracting shows minimal recent reporting: $636 thousand invoiced in FY2023 across 1.2 FTEs under a single NOAA satellite sustainment engineering and software upkeep contract, with a derived government-paid rate of $248.54/hr. FY2025 SCI data shows 12.4 FTEs delivered across 10 prime and 6 subcontracted records, but no dollar amount invoiced in the captured records — indicating the division's substantive federal work flows through higher-value engineering contracts and complex spacecraft development IDIQs outside standard SCI thresholds. Across SCI-reportable prime contracts, the vendor self-performed all contractor hours with no subcontractor labor share reported, though the full award portfolio shows extensive teaming with specialized suppliers including Ensign-Bickford Aerospace & Defense, Rosemount Aerospace, Redwire Space Enterprises, Applied Aerospace Structures, Moog, Thales Alenia Space, and Southwest Research Institute on the Space Weather Next Lagrange Series delivery order.

Federal grant work adds six research and development recipients spanning NASA's Science Mission Directorate ROSES program, including $4.998 million for balanced science research across Earth, Moon, Mars and exploration applications (awarded January 2025), $4.5 million for the Compact Hyperspectral Prism Spectrometer for Space (awarded November 2024), $1.336 million for the Multi-Detector Experiment for Next-Generation Applications in Heliophysics (awarded March 2024), and additional awards for quantum measurement astronomy, lunar pole imaging, and selective infrared spectral filtering technology. Sub-grant work with universities and non-profits includes spacecraft systems engineering support to the University of Colorado for the Dynamical Neutral Atmosphere-Ionosphere Coupling (DAPHNE) mission, environmental testing support through Planetary Science Institute, sensor requirements development and optical testing with Atmospheric & Environmental Research, and instrument development coordination with the Smithsonian Institution and California Institute of Technology.

The capability footprint reflects a prime systems integrator and instruments developer for space missions: hyperspectral imaging sounders and radiometers for Earth observation; spacecraft bus design, integration, and test; antenna development across Ka-band, microwave, and RF domains; cryogenic subsystems; optical sensor manufacturing; thermal and structural analysis; test, teardown, and repair of optical and electronic systems; mission operations support; and classified space domain awareness algorithm development. Primary NAICS codes span 541330 (Engineering Services, 172 awards), 332710 (Other Aircraft Parts Manufacturing, 93 awards), 541712 (Research and Development in Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences, 90 awards), and 334220 (Radio and Television Broadcasting Equipment Manufacturing, 60 awards).