Tag: Portal Space Systems

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Portal Space gets a $50M boost for faster space mobility

Illustration: Portal's Starburst and Supernova vehicles in Earth orbit
An artist's conception shows Portal’s Starburst and Supernova spacecraft in Earth orbit. (Portal Space Systems Illustration)

Bothell, Wash.-based Portal Space Systems has raised $50 million in a funding round aimed at speeding up development of the Seattle-area startup’s highly maneuverable space vehicles.

The first such vehicle, Starburst-1, is due for launch as early as this fall as a payload on SpaceX’s Transporter-18 satellite rideshare mission. Portal is also getting ready to move into a 52,000-square-foot manufacturing facility where future Starburst spacecraft and even more capable Supernova space vehicles will be built.

Portal CEO Jeff Thornburg — who co-founded the company in 2021 following stints at tech ventures including SpaceX and Stratolaunch Systems — characterized the newly announced Series A funding round as closer to a giant leap than a small step.

“The thing that’s exciting me the most, and really the company at large, is that it helps us move faster,” he told me. “We’re obviously focused on getting Starburst and Supernova capabilities demonstrated and available to our customers as quickly as we can.”

The round was led by Geodesic Capital and Mach33, with participation by Booz Allen Ventures, AlleyCorp and FUSE. It builds on a $17.5 million seed round that was announced last year.

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Portal Space Systems gets its first payload into orbit

SpaceX night launch
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket sends more than 100 payloads into orbit from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. (SpaceX Photo)

Bothell, Wash.-based Portal Space Systems has made its first foray into Earth orbit, in the form of a piggyback payload that will test technologies for highly maneuverable space vehicles.

The instrument package, which is about the size of a tissue box, was one of 119 payloads sent into orbit at 4:02 a.m. PT today from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California for SpaceX’s Transporter-16 satellite rideshare mission. Portal’s “Mini-Nova” payload was attached to Momentus’ Vigoride-7 orbital service vehicle for the ride on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

Minutes after launch, the Falcon 9’s first-stage booster landed autonomously on a drone ship that was stationed in the Pacific. Meanwhile, the second stage proceeded to orbit and deployed Vigoride-7 and other spacecraft.

“I’ve said for a long time that a company only really becomes a space company once it gets to space, and with last night’s launch out of Vandenberg, that’s now true for Portal,” the company’s co-founder and CEO, Jeff Thornburg, said in a LinkedIn post.

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Portal teams up with Paladin for orbital trash disposal

Illustration: Triton-equipped Starburst and Supernova spacecraft in orbit.
An artist's conception shows Portal Space Systems' Starburst spacecraft at left and its larger Supernova platform in the distance at right, both outfitted with Paladin Space's Triton payload for orbital debris tracking and removal. (Portal Space Systems Illustration)

Bothell, Wash.-based Portal Space Systems is partnering with an Australian venture called Paladin Space on a commercial service that would round up and dispose of potentially dangerous orbital debris.

The concept — known as Debris Removal as a Service, or DRAAS — is meant to address one of the most pernicious problems facing spacecraft operators: how to dodge tens of thousands of pieces of space junk that are zipping through Earth orbit.

Since its founding in 2021, Portal has been focusing on the development of maneuverable orbital vehicles that could rendezvous with other satellites, either for servicing or for disposal. Its flagship is the Supernova in-space mobility platform, which will be equipped with an innovative solar thermal propulsion system. There’ll also be a smaller version of the spacecraft, called Starburst.

Starburst-1 is due for launch as early as this year, and Supernova is scheduled to make its debut in 2027.

Meanwhile, Paladin Space has been working on a reusable payload called Triton, which is designed to track and capture tumbling pieces of orbital debris that are less than 1 meter (3 feet) in size. That small-to-medium size category accounts for most of the debris that’s being tracked in orbit.

“Triton is built to remove dozens of those objects in a single mission, which fundamentally changes the cost structure of debris remediation and provides the greatest benefit to satellite operators,” Paladin CEO Harrison Box said today in a news release.

The Portal-Paladin partnership calls for installing Triton hardware on Starburst spacecraft. Portal’s orbital platform would go out in search of space junk, and Paladin’s payload would grab the debris. When Triton’s trash bin is full, it would be dropped off for safe disposal while the spacecraft remains in orbit for continued servicing.

The companies are targeting an initial deployment in 2027, focusing on heavily trafficked bands of low Earth orbit. Future missions may use Supernova’s added capabilities to service a wider variety of orbits.

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Portal Space’s satellite factory wins support from state

Illustration: Portal Space Systems' Supernova space vehicle in orbit
An artist’s conception shows the Supernova spacecraft in orbit. (Portal Space Systems Illustration)

Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson is setting aside $350,000 from an economic development fund to support Portal Space Systems’ expansion into a new 50,000-square-foot satellite manufacturing facility in Bothell, Wash.

Ferguson announced today that he’s directing the state Department of Commerce to award funds from the Governor’s Economic Development Strategic Reserve Fund to Economic Alliance Snohomish County. The funding will help Portal transition from testing and development to scalable production, with a goal of building four spacecraft a month by 2027.

The expansion is expected to create more than 100 jobs in the next two years, and more than 700 jobs by 2030.

“Strategic Reserve Funds are targeted investments that create good paying jobs and spur innovation across Washington,” Ferguson said in a news release. “This project not only achieves those goals, it also reaffirms our state’s role as a leader in the space industry. I am proud to support pioneering projects like this in Washington.”

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How a decades-old idea sparked a hot new space venture

Portal CEO Jeff Thornburg with vacuum chamber
Portal Space Systems CEO Jeff Thornburg checks out the vacuum chamber where space hardware is tested. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle)

BOTHELL, Wash. — Before he became the CEO of Portal Space Systems, Jeff Thornburg worked for two of the world’s most innovative space-minded billionaires. Now he’s working on an idea those billionaires never thought to pursue: building a spacecraft powered by the heat of focused sunlight.

Thornburg and his teammates are aiming to make Bothell-based Portal the first commercial venture to capitalize on solar thermal propulsion, a technology studied decades ago by NASA and the U.S. Air Force. The concept involves sending a propellant through a heat exchanger, where the heat gathered up from sunlight causes it to expand and produce thrust, like steam whistling out of a teakettle.

The technology is more fuel-efficient than traditional chemical propulsion — and faster-acting than solar electric propulsion, which uses solar arrays to turn sunlight into electricity to power an ion drive. Solar thermal propulsion nicely fills a niche between those two methods to move a spacecraft between orbits. But neither NASA nor the Air Force followed up on the concept.

“They didn’t abandon it for technical reasons,” Thornburg said. At the time, it just didn’t make economic or strategic sense to take the concept any further.

What’s changed?

“Lower launch costs, coupled with additive manufacturing, are the major unlocks to bring the tech to life, and make it affordable and in line with commercial development,” Thornburg said.

Thornburg argues that it’s the right time for Portal’s spacecraft to fill a gap in America’s national security posture on the high frontier. “There was no imperative for rapid movement on orbit in the 1990s,” he said. “Only recently have the threats from our adversaries highlighted the weaknesses in current electric propulsion systems, in that they have so little thrust and can’t enable rapid mobility.”

Portal’s vision has attracted interest — and financial support — from investors and potential customers. Since its founding in 2021, the startup has raised more than $20 million in venture capital. In 2024, Portal won a commitment for $45 million in public-private funding from SpaceWERX, the innovation arm of the U.S. Space Force. And next year, Portal is due to demonstrate its hardware for the first time in orbit.

So, how did Thornburg hit upon the idea of turning a decades-old idea into reality?

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Portal unveils a new breed of maneuverable spacecraft

Illustration: Starburst spacecraft in orbit with Supernova vehicle in background
Artwork shows Portal’s Starburst spacecraft in the foreground with its Supernova vehicle in the background. (Portal Space Systems Illustration)

Bothell, Wash.-based Portal Space Systems has added another spacecraft to its product line: a rapid-maneuverability vehicle called Starburst, which takes advantage of technologies that are being developed for its more powerful Supernova satellite platform.

Starburst-1 is due to star in Portal’s first free-flying space mission with live payloads a year from now, starting with a launch on SpaceX’s Transporter-18 satellite rideshare mission. Portal says the mission will demonstrate rendezvous and proximity operations, rapid retasking and rapid orbital change for national security and commercial applications.

Starburst is designed to bring maneuverability to missions that rely on constellations of small satellites, an approach known as proliferated space architecture. Such an approach is already being used for commercial constellations including SpaceX’s Starlink and Amazon’s Project Kuiper, and the concept is also gaining traction for national security applications.

Portal says Starburst and the larger Supernova platform will share many manufacturing processes and core systems, including the thrusters being developed for Supernova’s reaction control system. Like Supernova, Starburst will use heated ammonia as a propellant.

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Sunlight-powered propulsion system passes a big test

Thruster glows as it undergoes testing in vacuum chamber
Portal’s heat exchanger thruster, known as Flare, fires up during a test in a vacuum chamber. (Portal Space Systems Photo)

Bothell, Wash.-based Portal Space Systems says it has successfully tested its solar thermal propulsion system at operational temperatures inside a vacuum chamber, marking a first for the commercial space industry.

The test marks a key step in the development of Portal’s 3D-printed heat exchanger thruster, known as Flare. The thruster is part of a propulsion system that converts concentrated sunlight into heat. That heat would warm up an ammonia-based propellant to produce thrust and send Portal’s Supernova satellite platform where it needs to go.

Supernova is designed to maneuver payloads quickly between orbital locations — for example, to head off close encounters between a growing number of commercial satellites, or to respond to space-based threats from rivals such as China and Russia.

NASA and the U.S. Air Force have experimented with solar thermal propulsion since the 1960s, but Portal is the first commercial venture to capitalize on the concept. Solar thermal propulsion would make Supernova more maneuverable than traditional spacecraft — with the ability to change orbits within hours or days, rather than weeks or months.

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Portal Space puts its spacecraft factory near home base

Portal Space Systems CEO Jeff Thornburg with flags on the wall behind him
Portal CEO Jeff Thornburg says the company is expanding its footprint in Bothell, Wash. (Portal Space Systems Photo)

Portal Space Systems says it’s decided to set up its 50,000-square-foot spacecraft manufacturing facility just 3 miles away from its existing design and testing hub in Bothell, Wash.

By the end of 2026, the factory should be ready to start producing Portal’s Supernova space vehicles, which are being designed to use an innovative solar thermal propulsion system to maneuver payloads between orbital locations.

“With growing demand from both our commercial and defense partners, this new facility marks the next strategic step in Portal’s evolution,” Portal CEO Jeff Thornburg said today, in a news release that was issued in conjunction with the Paris Air Show. “By expanding our footprint in Bothell, we’re doubling down on local talent, proximity to core operations, and a growing aerospace ecosystem supported by state leadership.”

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Portal raises $17.5M for spacecraft powered by sun’s heat

Illustration: Portal Space Systems' Supernova space vehicle in orbit
An artist’s conception shows the Supernova spacecraft in orbit. (Portal Space Systems Illustration)

Bothell, Wash.-based Portal Space Systems says it has raised $17.5 million in seed funding to accelerate the development of its Supernova space vehicle, which aims to harness the heat of the sun to power rapid-response maneuvers in orbit.

The oversubscribed investment round was led by AlleyCorp, with participation from Mach33, FUSE, First In, TFX, Offline Ventures. Atypical and other strategic investors. Portal said the funding will support the first full-scale demonstration of Supernova, with launch scheduled for mid-2026.

“Our vision is to provide next-gen spacecraft that today’s space operations demand and our nation deserves,” Portal CEO Jeff Thornburg said today in a news release. “This funding is a testament to the increasing recognition that maneuverability at will is the critical need in both defense and commercial space operations.”

Supernova will make use of a solar thermal propulsion system, with large, lightweight reflectors that focus the sun’s rays on a heat exchanger. When an ammonia-based propellant passes through the heat exchanger, it rapidly builds up pressure and produces thrust.

Thornburg said Supernova can “deliver the performance of nuclear thermal propulsion without the burden of launching a reactor.” The system is designed to push Supernova and its payloads from, say, low Earth orbit to a geostationary orbit in a matter of hours. In contrast, it might take a traditional space propulsion system weeks or months to execute a similar set of maneuvers, according to Portal.

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Portal provides a sneak peek at solar propulsion system

Ribbon-cutting ceremony at Portal Space Systems
VIPs cut the ribbon at Portal Space Systems’ HQ in Bothell, Wash. From left: U.S. Rep. Suzan DelBene; Portal co-founders Prashaanth Ravindran, Jeff Thornburg and Ian Vorbach; and Bothell Mayor Mason Thompson. (Credit: Portal Space Systems)

BOTHELL, Wash. — From the outside, Portal Space Systems’ headquarters looks like a standard-issue office space in a Bothell business park. But inside, the Portal team is working to harness the heat of the sun, to speed up how spacecraft get around.

“Think about it as finally bringing what you see in Star Trek into reality in orbit, to actually move spacecraft the way Hollywood had originally intended,” Jeff Thornburg, Portal’s CEO and co-founder, said at today’s ribbon-cutting ceremony for the 8,000-square-foot development lab and HQ.

The hardware that’s spread across Portal’s lab tells you that the four-year-old venture is no typical business-park tenant: In one corner, there’s a gleaming vacuum chamber where components for Portal’s solar thermal propulsion system are being tested. In another corner, a 3D printer stands ready to turn out the parts for subscale test models of the system’s heat-exchanger thruster.

Portal plans to build the system into its Supernova satellite platform. Supernova is designed to use foldable mirrors to focus the sun’s rays onto a heat exchanger. When ammonia passes through the heat exchanger, it rapidly builds up pressure and produces thrust.

Thornburg said the system provides several advantages over traditional rocket thrusters. For example, there’s no need for oxidizers or hard-to-handle cryogenic fuels. “We’re not burning anything,” Thornburg said. “We’re just concentrating the solar energy.”

The biggest advantage is that Supernova should be able to push itself and its attached payload into different orbits much more quickly than your typical spacecraft. “It has the ability to maneuver like nothing else that exists in orbit, which means it can go from low Earth orbit or medium Earth orbit to geostationary orbits within hours or a day,” Thornburg said. “Or it can move from one orbit to another quickly to accomplish a commercial or a defense mission with speeds that typically take weeks and months.”

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