{"id":586966,"date":"2026-04-16T03:11:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T03:11:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/586966\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T03:11:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T03:11:08","slug":"with-new-portfolios-sda-probably-wont-exist-acting-director-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/586966\/","title":{"rendered":"With new portfolios, SDA ‘probably won’t’ exist, acting director says"},"content":{"rendered":"

COLORADO SPRINGS \u2014 The rollout of new portfolio managers<\/a> across the Defense Department could have an acute impact on organizations like the Space Development Agency (SDA), which \u201cprobably won\u2019t\u201d carry the same name in the future as a result, according to its acting director.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to predict the future, but five years from now, they probably \u2014 the names of the organizations will be different than what you see today,\u201d Gurpartap (\u201cGP\u201d) Sandhoo told reporters today during a media briefing here at the Space Symposium conference.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere probably won\u2019t be an SDA or Space RCO [Rapid Capabilities Office] or SSC [Space Systems Command], there will be something else. What that ends up looking like is TBD,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth last year unveiled a sweeping effort<\/a> to reform Pentagon acquisitions, rolling out a new portfolio acquisition executive model that would group programs by missions under a single manager. The Pentagon intends to delegate more acquisition authorities to those individuals, and is working with Congress to provide them greater flexibility to shift funds between accounts.<\/p>\n

The Space Force plans to finalize its portfolio structure<\/a> within the next couple of months, a top service official said here Tuesday.<\/p>\n

SDA, Space RCO and SSC each focus on different missions. SDA launches satellites to low-earth orbit, where the agency is currently building out separate missile tracking and data transport constellations. Satellites bought by SSC, on the other hand, are usually for medium- and high-earth orbits. Space RCO, by comparison, is a relatively smaller office that seeks to quickly field cutting-edge commercial tech across orbits.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Representatives for the RCO and SSC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

While the Space Force\u2019s various acquisition arms may take a different shape down the road, Sandhoo emphasized their essential functions will persist.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The portfolio reshuffling \u201cwill change things in the Space Force, but what it doesn\u2019t change is the missions the Space Force has to go support,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Speaking during a later briefing, Air Force Secretary Troy Meink noted that the structure of organizations like SDA is a role model for the portfolio reorganization. Asked whether entities like SDA or Space RCO might be absorbed under new portfolio managers, Meink replied that some organizations are spelled out in law, requiring cooperation with lawmakers on some changes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAs we normalize [the portfolio structure] across all the department, we\u2019ll be working with the Hill,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of SDA\u2019s key projects \u2014 the establishment of a satellite constellation that can move data around the globe \u2014 has recently been in doubt, as officials ponder whether to cancel<\/a> a third tranche of the so-called Transport Layer and tap SpaceX for that work instead. Sandhoo today said SDA will field the first two Transport Layer tranches, but he wasn\u2019t sure of the third tranche\u2019s fate. The mission of the data transport constellation will transition to the purview of a new portfolio manager for space-based sensing and targeting, said Sandhoo, who will presumably make that decision.<\/p>\n

Sandhoo added that the Transport Layer has now essentially grown in scope. A budding effort called the Space Data Network (SDN)<\/a> is expected to serve as an overarching architecture linking up various communication constellations, to include the Transport Layer.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything we\u2019re doing on the Transport Layer at SDA should be part of that Space Data Network,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The Space Force\u2019s new Objective Force<\/a> plan projecting the service\u2019s future force structure through 2040 explains that the Transport Layer will be absorbed into the SDN\u2019s \u201cbackbone,\u201d a mesh network of low Earth orbiting satellites operating in Ku- and S-band frequencies for low-latency, high capacity satellite communications data relay, to provide \u201cmass messaging\u201d to users.<\/p>\n

Theresa Hitchens contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"COLORADO SPRINGS \u2014 The rollout of new portfolio managers across the Defense Department could have an acute impact…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":586967,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[1572,79,193,25880,11716,172947,256766,14931],"class_list":{"0":"post-586966","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-pete-hegseth","9":"tag-science","10":"tag-space","11":"tag-space-development-agency","12":"tag-space-force","13":"tag-space-rapid-capabilities-office","14":"tag-space-symposium-2026","15":"tag-space-systems-command"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=586966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586966\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/586967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=586966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=586966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=586966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}