Bloomberg, citing anonymous sources, reported that satellite startup Impulse Space and defense tech company Anduril were tapped to develop prototypes for the space-based missile tracking and targeting technology that will make up Golden Dome.
Golden Dome is the Trump administration’s ambitious plan to build a network of space-based satellites to detect and thwart any potential air attack on American soil, something that isn’t particularly an emerging threat, much less an immediate threat to resolve, given that there hasn’t been a successful military attack on American soil since World War II.
Trump announced the project in an executive order when he took office in January 2025, but since then, its timeline has been largely kept secret. A May 2025 Congressional Budget Office report said construction could take 20 years, but an August 2025 CNN report claimed the first major test of the Golden Dome was scheduled for just before the 2028 presidential election. Reports of contracts signed between the Pentagon and space and defense technology companies provide a glimpse of how the administration is moving forward with the program.
At the heart of this satellite network will be space-based interceptors, which will detect and destroy enemy missiles and drones at an early stage. The technology does not yet exist and is considered theoretically ineffective and impractical.
The Space Force began conducting market research on space-based interceptor capabilities last summer, according to a request for information from June 2025, saying that after reviewing responses, they might meet with select companies to discuss next steps. Now, a Bloomberg report claims that Impulse Space, led by Tom Mueller, Elon Musk’s first appointment at SpaceX, will serve as a subcontractor to Anduril to develop the technology.
A previous Reuters report claimed that defense contractors Northrop Grumman, True Anomaly and Lockheed Martin, along with Anduril, were also working with the government to build prototypes of space-based interceptors and other related systems for Golden Dome. Reuters said at the time that the companies had so far won preliminary awards and would compete for final production contracts.
Similar moonshot plans for an ironclad missile defense system have been discussed since the time of former President Reagan, but the plans have never been truly and fully translated into reality. Some critics have called the program scientifically impossible and likely to be too expensive, with one study estimating the cost to be as high as $3.6 trillion by 2045.
The leading political think tank Brookings Institution called the plan “an expensive and unsustainable deployment of space-based interceptors”, and warned that it could encourage similar deployments by China and Russia, leading to “a new arms race that will make us less safe rather than more.”
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