SmallSat Symposium<\/a>\u00a0in Silicon Valley, CA organized by Satnews Events on Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2026, executives detailed the rapid evolution of the space data layer, which promises to connect isolated satellites through optical relays and on-orbit compute capabilities. However, the path to a fully realized orbital network hinges not just on advanced hardware, but on fierce competitors becoming \u201ccompetitive mates\u201d who champion open standards and zero-trust security.<\/p>\nThe panel was moderated by Dr. Victor Aguero (CEO and Co-Founder, Cambrian Works, Inc.) and panelists included Carol Craig (CEO & Founder, Sidus Space), Beau Jarvis (Chief Revenue Officer, Kepler Communications), David Marvin (Product Lead, Forests & Wildfire, Planet Labs), Rob DeMillo (CEO & Cofounder, Sophia Space), and Richard Hadsall (VP of Americas, Integrasys).<\/p>\n
The shift to data science<\/p>\n
The defining sentiment of the panel was captured by Victor Aguero, CEO of Cambrian Works, who noted that the industry is \u201cmoving away from rocket science to data science.\u201d While building space systems and scaling constellations remains difficult, the focus has shifted from merely getting assets into orbit to integrating them into the global IT infrastructure. Space is no longer going to be separate, Aguero noted, emphasizing that the new space data layer must offer the same speed and trust as terrestrial networks.<\/p>\n
Redefining \u201creal-time\u201d<\/p>\n
For years, the term \u201creal-time\u201d in Earth observation has been a well worn word, often meaning a delay of thirty minutes or even two hours. Beau Jarvis, Chief Revenue Officer at Kepler, pointed out that true real-time literally means real-time, such as routing data through an optical network in under a second.<\/p>\n
David Marvin, Product Lead at Planet, illustrated the stakes with a wildfire scenario. Instead of downlinking gigabytes of raw images for ground processing, onboard edge computing could process the data instantly, sending only the critical vector data\u2014like fire lines and safe evacuation routes\u2014to incident commanders within a minute.<\/p>\n
\u201cCompetitive Mates\u201d and interoperability<\/p>\n
Despite technological progress, the panel warned that silos remain a major threat to the space data layer. Carol Craig, CEO of Sidus Space, argued that for the ecosystem to mature, companies must become \u201ccompetitive mates\u201d rather than pure competitors, because everyone needs to learn from each other\u2019s data.<\/p>\n
Jarvis agreed, noting that Kepler adheres to open standards like the Space Development Agency (SDA) and ESA protocols to ensure interoperability. \u201cWe can\u2019t build a bunch of siloed systems,\u201d Jarvis stated.<\/p>\n
Congestion and security<\/p>\n
While optical communications are seen as a major enabler for this layer due to high security and bandwidth, Richard Hadsall of Integrasys provided a reality check regarding the radio frequency (RF) spectrum. Hadsall noted that with more constellations going up, RF interference and spectrum congestion are constant threats.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, as space systems become heavily software-defined, they become vulnerable to cyberattacks. \u201cZero trust is something that just has to happen,\u201d said DeMillo, emphasizing that interconnects between satellites require robust security architectures from day one.<\/p>\n
While isolated nodes and \u201cislands of compute\u201d exist today, a fully interconnected, multi-vendor space data layer is still years away with estimates ranging from 3 to 10 years.<\/p>\n
\n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For decades, the primary challenge of the satellite industry was simply getting hardware off the ground. Now, as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":486400,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[49,195959,48,195960,65109,110548,115851,195961,74309,61],"class_list":{"0":"post-486399","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-technology","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-cambrian-works","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-integrasys","12":"tag-kepler-communications","13":"tag-planet-labs","14":"tag-sidus-space","15":"tag-smallsat-symposium-silicon-valley","16":"tag-sophia-space","17":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=486399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486399\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/486400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=486399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=486399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=486399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}