NASA took a major step towards their plan to commercialize Near-Earth communications services this week. NASA’s Communications Services Program (CSP) at NASA Glenn Research Center has released their draft Announcement for Proposal (AFP) earlier this week. They’re seeking demonstrations from U.S. companies to develop healthy, commercially-provided satellite communication capabilities for near-Earth operations. The release of this draft AFP is a major milestone for NASA, and an exciting look at their plans to engage in the utilization of commercial SATCOM services for future missions.

The graphic below displays what use cases the AFP is accepting requests for.