Expanded Commercial Service USSF Office Aims to Synchronize Government-Industry Innovation; Col. Richard Kniseley Quoted

Posted on June 9, 2023 by Design in Design Innovation | 0 Comments

The Space System Command’s newly amplified Commercial Space Office is intending to take advantage of industry innovation and growth to equip warfighters with the best products and services from the sector, said Col. Richard Kniseley, senior materiel leader of COMSO.

The expanded version of the Commercial Services Office is also collaborating with the National Reconnaissance Office, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and NASA to foster its private sector partnerships, he said Thursday.

COMSO resulted from the SSC’s addition of responsibilities to CSCO as part of the U.S. Space Force’s resilience goal, which it aims to meet by 2026. The division is an amalgamation of the SSC Front Door, the Commercial Satellite Communications Office, the Space Domain Awareness Marketplace, the early-stage Commercial Augmented Space Reserves program, and USSF tech innovation arm SpaceWERX.

The office is exploring areas where the private sector has significantly advanced, such as launch services; space situational awareness, on-orbit servicing and logistics; intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; range and network operations; weather monitoring; and data generation, analysis and transmission.

Kniseley said their office will work on minimizing duplicate tech development efforts between government and industry in order to speed up innovation.

“We will focus on understanding how to implement flexible contracting, aligned with the [Federal Acquisition Regulation], and leveraging the successes of mission partners, including the NRO and Space Development Agency, to enable this office to move with speed and agility to identify and integrate commercial capabilities in support of the warfighter,” Kniseley explained.