What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project 657MEO of PE 1206447SF. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
Space: Final testing and integration of flight payloads and satellite buses for Plane 1. These events will culminate in satellite shipment to launch site at Cape Canaveral and initial launch capability. Immediately following launch, Millennium Space Systems will conduct early orbit checkout and testing procedures. The vendor will then conduct operational testing of the full orbital plane of satellites. In addition, Epoch 1 will be going through assembly, integration and testing of Plane 2 in preparation for a second launch and on-orbit test campaign beginning in mid to late FY 2028. Ground: Conduct site configuration and instrumentation efforts, including RF interference testing, installation of hardware, system integration, and execute engineering support during developmental testing and implement corrective actions, through the use of a deficiency reporting list, resulting from developmental testing at GEP sites at Schriever Space Force Base, Al Udeid Air Base, and Clear Space Force Station, as well as the MEO Space Operations Center (MSOC) located at the Boulder Ground Innovation Facility (BGIF).
FY 2027 increase due to continuing execution of MEO Epoch 1 testing and integration of flight payloads and satellite buses and start maintenance of Ground Entry Point (GEP) sites.
FY2026: the year under way
Prior-year accomplishments and current-year plans from the same exhibit. Context for the FY2027 plan, not a series — an activity partitions its project exactly in the request year, but can under-cover it in earlier years.
Space: Crucial deliveries of payloads and satellite buses from the remaining contractor for integration and assembly. The vendor intends to deliver flight payloads and satellite buses for the first six satellites and begin space vehicle level assembly, integration and testing. Millennium Space Systems will initiate assembling and testing space vehicles 7-12 to complete two orbital planes of capability. They will complete launch vehicle integration studies and launch vehicle selection for both launches, and support first launch no earlier than the end of 3Q FY 2027. Ground: Contractor will complete software builds for both command and control and mission data processing; The MEO Space Operations Center (MSOC) fit up at the Boulder Ground Innovation Facility (BGIF) will be completed and the operations floor will be prepared for launch rehearsals. The Ground Entry Point (GEP) contractor will complete Integration, test, validation, and verification in preparation for launch rehearsals and Launch and Early On-Orbit Test campaign. Ground antenna initialization and system end to end testing at the BGIF, Schriever Space Force Base, Al Udeid Air Base, Clear Space Force Station, and other associated antennas will be completed in FY 2026. Data Fusion: Finalize verification and validation campaigns to ensure the fidelity of the models are adequate to be integrated into enterprise sensor test campaigns spanning the entire Overhead Persistent Infrared architecture. In FY 2026, major simulation and ground test campaign planning will occur to ensure sensor models and live on-orbit data will be ingested at the appropriate missile warning and missile defense test events occurring in FY 2026-2027. Work with data fusion programs (FORGE, BOA, Persistent Unified Messaging Architecture) to ensure on-orbit data is timely and accurate.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | Actual | 458.9 |
| FY2026 | Enacted | 207.2 |
| FY2027 | Request | 259.2 |
This activity is 18% of project 657MEO's FY2027 request and 18% of PE 1206447SF's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
2 activities in project 657MEO
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the program-element page.