Defense One:

Two companies will build 28 satellite prototypes with enhanced missile-tracking abilities—and the promise of being able to keep up with next-generation hypersonics—after a $1.3 billion award, defense officials announced Monday.

Each company is slated to build 14 satellites “to collect infrared data and provide network communications” for continuous missile detection, warning, tracking, and identification worldwide, according to a news release. The tracking layer works in tandem with the transport layer’s mesh communication network of satellites in low-Earth orbit–which can continue to function even if some parts are damaged or destroyed—and can handle conventional and advanced missile tracking.

Current missile tracking abilities are limited in that regard and largely designed to warn based on an initial launch.

Click here to read the full story