The Aerospace Corporation

The Aerospace Corporation, a non-profit federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) headquartered in El Segundo, California, provides systems engineering, mission assurance, technical assessment, and scientific research services to federal space agencies as a prime contractor on delivery orders and grants across full-and-open federal procurements with no small-business set-asides. The corporation operates on cost-plus-fixed-fee and time-and-materials pricing structures across NASA, the Department of Defense, the National Nuclear Security Administration, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the National Science Foundation, performing substantially all work in-house without reliance on named subcontractors for labor delivery on tracked federal service contracts.

The Aerospace Corporation's customer footprint centers on space agency missions. The top five funding agencies by award count account for 54% of recent awards, led by NASA Langley Research Center (295 awards, $166.2 million combined potential value), the Department of the Air Force (189 awards), NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (172 awards, $130.1 million), NASA Headquarters (148 awards, $299.4 million), and NASA Goddard Space Center (122 awards, $1.61 billion). The top-five ranking by potential value surface a different concentration: NASA Goddard ($1.61 billion across 122 awards), NOAA ($775.1 million across 118 awards), NASA Johnson Space Center ($683 million across 36 awards), NASA Headquarters ($299.4 million across 148 awards), and NASA Langley ($166.2 million across 295 awards). The gap between volume and dollars reflects Goddard and Johnson's larger per-order ceilings versus Langley's numerous smaller technical tasks.

Recent capability work demonstrates breadth across civil and defense space. Representative prime delivery orders include a $72 million NASA-wide specialized engineering, evaluation, and test services (NSEETS) order from Goddard (October 2024, completion September 2028) spanning multiple NASA field centers for systems engineering and mission assurance; a $12.5 million Space Launch System independent verification and validation task from Marshall (September 2024, completion September 2027) for Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage software; a $146.2 million systems engineering and integration delivery order from the National Nuclear Security Administration (June 2025, completion June 2030) for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation and Defense Programs; an $11.18 million Commercial Crew Program and Low-Earth Orbit Program safety and mission assurance order from Kennedy Space Center (October 2023, completion September 2027); and a $14.68 million Landsat mission operations contract from the Office of Acquisitions and Grants (May 2026, completion May 2031). Grant work includes NASA ROSES awards for exploration science, space physics research, and particle precipitation studies, with representative grants of $951 thousand (Conductivity Across Space and Time as Informed by Particle Precipitation, NASA Science Mission Directorate, completion May 2028), $864 thousand (ROSES exploration and space science, NASA, completion June 2028), and $712.6 thousand (ROSES exploration science, NASA, completion February 2028).

The Aerospace Corporation operates under a constellation of parent indefinite-delivery vehicles. The top vehicle by task-order count is Indefinite Delivery Contract 80GSFC19D0011 (372 task orders, $899.4 million combined potential value), followed by NNL04AA09B (119 task orders, $22.8 million), NNJ11HB94C (76 task orders, $227.7 million), and NNG11VH00B (110 task orders, $149.3 million). In addition, The Aerospace Corporation holds single-award IDIQs with NNSA ($250 million ceiling, awarded June 2025, completion May 2030) for systems engineering and integration supporting Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation and Defense Programs, NOAA ($24 million, awarded September 2024, completion September 2029) for systems engineering and integration to the Office of Space Commerce, and the FAA ($9.7 million, awarded August 2024, completion August 2026) for the Space Exploration and Advancement Systems project. These vehicles enable responsive task authorization for technical advisory and systems engineering work across federal space agencies.

Activity has remained stable to modest over the past five years — 48 awards in 2022, 53 in 2023, 76 in 2024, 57 in 2025, and 64 in 2026 — reflecting a consolidation of work volume into larger delivery orders rather than count-based growth. A material recompete cliff looms: 120 awards (combined potential value $19.63 billion) reach ultimate completion within the next twenty-four months, exposing The Aerospace Corporation to recompete risk on a substantial portion of its active NASA and NNSA portfolio.

SCI-reported invoiced revenue on federal service contracts above the $150,000 threshold grew from $53 million in FY2022 to $1.34 billion in FY2025, reflecting significant ramp in delivery order execution. The FY2025 footprint shows 2,683 FTEs delivering government-paid services at a median hourly rate of $183.68/hr, with 10th and 90th percentile rates of $109.23/hr and $262.24/hr respectively — a spectrum consistent with a mix of technical staff, senior engineers, and program management roles. Across all SCI-reportable prime contracts, The Aerospace Corporation performs zero percent of contractor hours through named subcontractors, self-performing all labor delivery on tracked service contracts. This posture aligns with the corporation's FFRDC designation and its role as an independent technical advisor where internal expertise and continuity are mission-critical.

The Aerospace Corporation operates as a tax-exempt corporate entity without SBA set-aside certifications (8(a), HUBZone, SDVOSB, WOSB) and competes on full-and-open procurements, reflecting its FFRDC status and exemption from small-business set-aside requirements. The source identifies nine named subsidiaries, all structured as non-profit or limited-liability variants of The Aerospace Corporation, supporting its tax-exempt and organizational mission. As a prime on 1,692 of 1,728 awards (98% of recent activity), the corporation maintains minimal subcontractor engagement — a sub-award footprint of 36 awards (2%) spanning NASA-managed research relationships with universities including the University of New Hampshire, Southwest Research Institute, UCLA, the University of Texas at Arlington, and Johns Hopkins University, primarily for instrumental development and scientific research collaboration on space missions rather than for systems engineering or mission assurance services.