Capella Space Corporation

Capella Space Corporation, a commercial Earth observation satellite manufacturer based in Louisville, Colorado, operates as a prime contractor delivering synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery, data products, and related space domain awareness services to federal defense and civilian agencies on full-and-open and set-aside contracts, with 97% of recent awards held as prime contracts across 30 federal awards totaling $27.48 billion in combined potential value.

Capella Space is a for-profit manufacturer of commercial satellite technology currently owned by parent company IonQ Inc. and operating through a named subsidiary, Capella Federal, Inc. The company competes predominantly in full-and-open federal procurements without SBA set-aside designations; recent awards include three total small business set-asides (the $14.99 million Synthetic Aperture Radar for Government Operations definitive contract with the Air Force Research Laboratory, a $249 thousand Phase I SBIR award from the Air Force, and a $1.7 million Phase II SBIR OTA from the Air Force) but the vast majority of prime work flows through unrestricted vehicles. Capella's federal footprint centers on research and development in physical, engineering, and life sciences (11 awards) and all-other professional, scientific, and technical services (9 awards), with secondary exposure in satellite telecommunications and surveying and mapping services.

Capella's customer concentration sits heavily with the Department of Defense. The Air Force Materiel Command Research Laboratory anchors the dollar value at $13.02 billion in combined potential (6 awards), driven primarily by two multi-billion-dollar Proliferated Low Earth Orbit (PLEO) satellite-services IDIQs: a $13 billion contract awarded by the Air Force Research Laboratory on July 15, 2025 (replacing an earlier DISA DITCO PLEO contract for new orders), and a $13 billion IDC issued by the Defense Information Systems Agency on July 18, 2023. The Department of the Air Force proper holds 7 awards with $958 million combined potential value, including a $14.99 million definitive contract for Synthetic Aperture Radar for Government Operations and a $1.8 million delivery order for advanced battle management systems under the Joint All Domain Command and Control Support IDIQ. NASA Headquarters accounts for 6 awards and $478.6 million combined potential, primarily through the $476 million Commercial SmallSat Data Acquisition (CSDA) Program IDIQ (awarded October 4, 2023, completion October 3, 2028) under which three delivery orders have been issued ($286,736 for the Capella Evaluation Task, $808 thousand for synthetic aperture radar tasking data, and $500 for metadata archive delivery). The Office of the Secretary of Defense and Department of Defense Washington Headquarters Service hold smaller positions ($1.2 million and $21 million combined potential respectively), including a $1.19 million Hybrid Space Architecture II OTA from OSD (ultimate completion January 13, 2026) and a $20 thousand HALO program OTA from the Air Force. Most recently, Capella was awarded a $151 billion Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity contract under the Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layered Defense (SHIELD) initiative by the Missile Defense Agency on December 29, 2025, with a single initial delivery order valued at $500.

Parent contract vehicles anchor Capella's repeatable procurement pathway. The three task orders issued under the $476 million NASA CSDA Program IDIQ carry $1.1 million combined potential value. Capella holds a single-award $1.48 million BPA call under CSDA for high-resolution SAR imagery data products at the USG EULA level. The $950 million Joint All Domain Command and Control Support IDIQ (awarded by the Department of the Air Force on June 9, 2022, ultimate completion May 28, 2025) generated one $1.8 thousand delivery order for advanced battle management systems in July 2022. The newly awarded $151 billion SHIELD IDIQ and the two multi-billion-dollar PLEO satellite-services contracts represent the vendor's largest vehicle positions and indicate positioned access to defense space modernization and proliferated LEO capabilities procurement.

Activity has grown year over year from four awards in 2021 to a peak of eight in 2023, then contracted to five in 2024 and four in 2025. Four awards (combined potential value $21.8 million) reach ultimate completion inside the next twenty-four months, representing recompete exposure. SCI-reported invoicing on federal service contracts captured above the $150 thousand threshold totaled $1.3 million in FY2024 (zero in FY2023) across two prime records with zero FTE trajectory reported, indicating minimal service-contract footprint; the vast majority of Capella's federal revenue flows through products and data delivery rather than labor-hour service work.

Capella operates as a prime on 97% of recent awards and does not subcontract significantly. The vendor holds a single grant sub-award role: a sub-recipient position under a University of Massachusetts NSF grant for the SNOWWI (Snow Water-equivalent Wide Swath Interferometer and Scatterometer) project, awarded September 7, 2023. Capella's capability portfolio centers on commercial SAR Earth observation—high-resolution imagery, tasking and data products, space domain awareness, and advanced battle management system support—delivered through a constellation of small commercial SAR satellites to support national defense space operations, civilian Earth science research, and disaster response applications.