Blue Origin to build new Florida satellite processing site for Space Force

Richard Tribou, Orlando Sentinel on Oct 9, 2025

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ORLANDO, Fla. — While Blue Origin was kept out of the Space Force’s latest round of national security missions, the government has opted to rely on Jeff Bezos’ company to build a new place to prep satellites for launch.

Space Systems Command announced Tuesday it had awarded to Blue Origin a $78.25 million contract to construct a space vehicle processing facility on the Space Coast by 2028.

Right now the Department of Defense is limited in its satellite processing capacity at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, which can cause a logjam for missions. The job involves fueling the space vehicles and then packing them for transport, and would be done for multiple companies, not just Blue Origin’s own craft.

“We are proud to work with the U.S. Space Force Space Systems Command to construct a new payload processing facility supporting multiple launch vehicle providers on Florida’s Space Coast,” Blue Origin said in an emailed statement. “This partnership will enhance Blue Origin’s capabilities to operate more efficiently and expand our capacity to support a higher launch cadence to meet customer needs.”

The Space Force relies on SpaceX and United Launch Alliance to make its launches out of the Space Coast for now, although Blue Origin has been approved to compete for future national security missions with its New Glenn rocket that has flown just once back in January. A second launch on a mission to Mars for NASA is slated to fly later this fall.

Blue Origin has already spent $3 billion for facilities at its expansive campus in Exploration Park on Merritt Island adjacent Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex as well as the refurbished Launch Complex 36 within the Space Force station.

The company did not say at which location it would construct the processing facility. It recently opened its new Lunar Plant 1 to build its Blue Moon Mark 2 lunar landers for NASA’s Artemis program. That added 200,000 square feet to more than 3 million square feet of building space at the Exploration Park site.

This is the second contract under the National Security Space Launch program’s competition for a “Commercial Solutions Opening” (CSO) to process space vehicles.

“This second CSO award reflects our continued commitment to meet both national security and commercial launch requirements,” said Space Force Col. Dan Highlander, Director of Operations Integration for SSC’s Assured Access to Space directorate.

The first awarded earlier this year for the same amount went to Astrotech Space Operations to expand facilities in California for west coast launches from Vandenberg Space Force Base by 2028.

Astrotech has a similar site in Titusville that is the primary provider on the Space Coast for processing payloads such as NASA satellites for launches.

The Blue Origin facility will allow for both government and commercial use, and augment the expected rise in launches on the Space Coast in the next few years from all companies.

“This additional capacity will ensure USSF is able to continue to deliver responsive and resilient launch capabilities to the warfighter, and the public-private partnership behind the new capacity enables us to cost-share with commercial industry to our mutual benefit.” Highlander said.

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