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In July, the team at EarthTraq, a dual-use space company, received an email suggesting we “go through the Space Force Front Door process.” It seemed simple. We offer clear applications for pressing U.S. national security needs. The front door appeared to be the place to learn about capability gaps and seek funding to address them. Between July and December 2025, we navigated three such “front doors” at the U.S. Space Force, National Reconnaissance Office, and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. We attended over 120 meetings with program managers, Pentagon officials, and operational units. We received endorsement letters from offices across the defense and intelligence communities. One consistent pattern emerged in the bureaucratic maze: People saw our technology’s value, but lacked flexible, fast-moving capital to fund it. And while we were in meetings admiring slide decks, China was already launching its own competitive space capabilities. To catch up, the U.S. government needs to consolidate fragmented entry points and convert capability gaps into commercial contracts at speed through a unified national security space front door.

These front doors (commercial engagement portals) were designed from the inside out, like looking at the stars through the wrong end of a telescope. To build an effective commercial engagement engine, the space acquisitions community needs to think like a startup. There is a disconnect between the current policy aspirations of the White House and the Department of Defense, to prioritize speed, innovation, and new commercial entrants, and the reality when commercial space companies seek to support national security. The gap is worse than frustrating for startups: It is the new valley of death. The reforms that leaders demand do not yet have implementation paths. Having been told what to do, the space acquisition community now needs to figure out how. I’m writing a perspective from industry on how a better front door could work.

The Current System: Front Doors to Nowhere

The commercial space industry engagement problem has two parts: a fragmented frontend and a broken backend. When startups go door-to-door across various industry engagement offices, they are often seeking either to understand problems that need solving or to pitch products for contracts. They leave disappointed because front door offices aren’t actually designed to share capability gaps or provide funding paths, and the sheer number of front door offices across the space sector means that companies give repeated briefings and receive redundant evaluations without making real progress.

Frontend

The national security space community operates multiple commercial engagement offices, each with its own submission process and relationship management system. The Space Force maintains the front door at Space Systems Command. The National Reconnaissance Office manages the Acquisition Research Center. The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency operates the Compass office. Defense Innovation Unit and In-Q-Tel provide additional entry points. Each operates independently, with minimal cross-agency information sharing.

This creates redundancy for companies and blind spots for agencies. A company briefing Space Systems Command on capabilities relevant to the National Reconnaissance Office may not recognize overlap in requirements. The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency remains unaware of providers already delivering relevant capabilities to the Department of Defense. Senior officials at the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering and the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition lack systematic ways to identify commercial providers addressing capability gaps they see at their level. NATO and international partner capability needs are rarely, if ever, incorporated.

The many front doors lead to cumbersome briefings and evaluations, but fail to communicate operational problems or identify who would fund solutions.

Backend

Even if companies can navigate the frontend, they hit a wall: There is no mechanism to align program executive office or directorate budgets with new commercial capabilities — those budgets are already committed to existing programs. When a promising commercial capability emerges, program managers who recognize its value have no flexible funding pool to tap. In December, Maj. Gen. Stephen Purdy said that “funding flexibility” would be at the top of his “Christmas wish list” for acquisition reform. The new Portfolio Acquisition Executives established by the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (Section 1802) have authorities to make trades within their portfolios, but they need actual uncommitted funding to exercise those authorities. No acquisition office can initiate an Other Transaction Agreement with money that’s not in the budget.

SpaceWERX deserves a shoutout here: They’ve demonstrated remarkable creativity in commercial engagement through Strategic Funding Increase and Tactical Funding Increase programs, proving what’s possible when acquisition professionals think entrepreneurially about existing authorities. But SpaceWERX’s scope is limited. Small Business Innovation Research offices can create pathways to contracts and demonstrations, but they cannot ensure program acquisition executives and directorates have flexible funding to scale winners into operational programs.

The Spirit is Willing…

On Jan. 9, 2026, the Department of Defense issued a memorandum titled “Transforming the Defense Innovation Ecosystem to Accelerate Warfighting Advantage.” The memo acknowledges precisely the issue we at EarthTraq encountered: “industry faces a maze of competing front doors,” and addresses both the front and backends of the problem.

First, it mandates unified industry engagement. The memo calls for ending overlapping front doors in favor of two streamlined channels: the Mission Engineering and Integration Activity to execute “problem-driven engagement organized around the Joint Force’s top Operational Problems — telling industry what we are trying to do,” and the Defense Innovation Unit to execute “product-driven engagement… helping program acquisition executives and program offices better adopt what industry has built.” The intent is to end the fragmentation.

Second, it establishes the funding source. Beginning in 2028, each program acquisition executive should include an Innovation Insertion Increment, a portfolio-managed funding allocation for rapid capability insertion. This will provide the flexible capital that program executive officers currently lack.

The recent memo is the latest in a series of complementary policies, including the Nov. 2025 Acquisition Transformation Strategy, the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, and the Dec. 2025 White House executive order titled “Ensuring American Space Superiority.” These directives share a common thread: They mandate structural changes to how the national security community engages industry. But policies alone do not thaw the frozen middle. Without an implementation mechanism, fragmented systems will remain.

The national security space community needs a single, integrated platform serving the Space Force, National Reconnaissance Office, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and other key partners. I call this the unified national security space front door.

The core concept: create an accessible industry entry point, empowered with fast-acting competitive funding. Instead of three separate offices, the unified national security space front door consolidates space problems (like resilient positioning or remote sensing) across agencies into one accessible platform. Companies can either respond to posted problems (the Mission Engineering and Integration Activity problem-driven engagement channel) or submit “open topic” pitches for commercial products they’ve already built (the Defense Innovation Unit product-driven engagement channel). Problem-driven submissions connect directly to specific capability gaps and associated stakeholders; product-driven submissions flow through Defense Innovation Unit for evaluation and potential adoption.

The unified national security space front door competes industry submissions through quarterly prize competitions. Under 10 U.S.C. § 4025 (the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act), agencies can award cash prizes for innovation outside traditional contracting processes. After companies submit solutions, some are selected for live pitches, and winners receive cash prizes (typically $5,000-$100,000) and clear pathways to Other Transaction Agreements. The Army’s xTech program already applies this model successfully: It has attracted over 9,000 submissions in seven years and, in partnership with the Global-Tactical Edge Acquisition Directorate, now moves from capability need to soldier experimentation and vendor award in under 90 days.

To be effective, a unified national security space front door needs a few key features.

First, continuous rolling submissions. Companies can enter at any time. Problem statements are posted as program acquisition executives and agency directorates identify needs, and they remain up until they are retired or resolved. Open topic product submissions are continuously evaluated by the Defense Innovation Unit for potential adoption by program acquisition executives and program offices. Companies can browse the unclassified or sanitized problem statements (past and present) of the entire national security space community in one place.

Second, engagement from each program acquisition executive or agency customer. Each of the new program acquisition executives, National Reconnaissance Office and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency directorates, and other government space stakeholders should assign unified national security space front door liaisons. This ensures problem statements reflect actual capability gaps rather than theoretical requirements, and that promising products get attention from officials with budget authority. Program acquisition executives should back problem statements and front door participation with Innovation Insertion Increment funding starting in 2028.

Third, competitive prize cycles every 90 days. While submissions are continuous, prizes occur quarterly. This creates urgency and competitive pressure. The 90-day cycle is fast enough to maintain momentum while giving evaluators time to properly assess technical merit. Front door liaisons and evaluators should select winners, not just acknowledge capability. This competitive dynamic drives companies to submit their strongest proposals and ensures only the most promising solutions advance to Other Transaction Agreements. Cash prizes ($5,000-$100,000) provide immediate validation and working capital for winners while signaling to venture investors that the government values the technology.

Fourth, transparent prize-to-contract pathways. Prize winners automatically become eligible for prototyping Other Transaction Agreements, with values ranging from $500,000 to $50 million plus. These contracts will be funded through program acquisition executive Innovation Insertion Increments starting in 2028. Agreements are pre-competed through the prize process, eliminating redundant evaluation cycles, and can be awarded within 30 days of the prize announcement. Importantly, successful prototype demonstration also allows larger production Other Transaction Agreements ($10M-$100 million plus) to be awarded for operational production and rapid scaling.

Fifth, integrated submission databases accessible across the space community. The unified national security space front door requires a shared, modern relationship management system that is searchable, automatically populates as companies submit, and is easy to update. All agencies will use this common platform to view and filter information about commercial companies. Thus, when a company briefs one agency, all are aware of the capability and can act. For space, it is critical that industry engagement reforms reach beyond the Pentagon to include the intelligence community and international partners.

The unified national security space front door helps clarify and stabilize demand signals with a clear path to longer contracts that encourage private investment. This addresses a persistent frustration: Defense and intelligence agencies have been directed to partner with venture capital and venture-backed startups. Yet investors need predictable revenue streams to justify capital deployment. Venture capitalists need to see a clear escalation path from prototype to production contracts worth tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.

… But the Flesh is Weak

The barrier to implementation isn’t technical, financial, or legal. It’s institutional. As other startups can attest, most space industry offices are slow-moving and risk-averse, a legacy of the era when launching a $1 billion satellite on a $400 million expendable rocket made any risk unacceptable. Because their role wasn’t seen as mission-critical, the various fragmented front door offices are under-resourced with archaic relationship management systems. Their success has long been measured not by the capability gaps they solve but by their value as a blockade to absorb the mass of companies that assail defense leadership with sales pitches.

Today, that model is indefensible. China’s more agile acquisition system produces weapons five to six times faster than ours does, and the United States cannot afford bureaucratic territorialism. Reform efforts too often produce innovation theater: memos and slide decks presenting false evidence of improvement, industry engagement metrics measured in meeting counts rather than outcomes. Recent policy changes provide the tools for genuine structural reform. The 2026 National Defense Authorization Act establishes the legal framework through program acquisition executive authorities and expanded other transaction authorities. The Jan. 9, 2026, memo creates engagement channels and a funding path through Innovation Insertion Increments. The Executive Order provides additional directives. What’s missing is the decision to consolidate these capabilities into a unified platform.

Consider the problem from both sides. EarthTraq spent five months navigating fragmented front doors to nowhere. Industry engagement staff spent that time manually entering data into outdated databases, hosting hundreds of briefings unconnected to operational value, and identifying technologies they couldn’t fund. The old requirements process, the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System, “moved at the speed of paperwork, not war,” so the Secretary of Defense eliminated it. The national security space community needs the same ruthless prioritization of outcomes over process. The unified national security space front door is one way to do so.

The unified national security space front door transforms industry engagement officials from gatekeepers into matchmakers running fast-paced prize competitions with clear pathways to larger contracts. Their success is measured by the capability gaps filled and the number of days to contract. It would have reduced EarthTraq’s five-month odyssey to 90 days: submit once, compete for a prize, win a prototype Other Transaction Agreement. Each month spent navigating bureaucracy is a month competitors spend operationalizing capabilities. Speed is the metric that matters.

Conclusion

Today, fragmented commercial front doors waste companies’ resources with slow, redundant processes. When they finally break through, even enthusiastic program managers lack mechanisms to act. So, companies give up on government markets, capability gaps persist, and competitors with more agile systems pull ahead. Consulting peers in business development at other commercial space companies, it’s clear these problems are shared. A change would benefit the entire network of innovative new space economy firms like EarthTraq that underpin U.S. leadership in space.

Reform is not optional. Recent policies demand it. The choice now is between genuine change and “lipstick on a pig” — surface adjustments that leave fragmentation intact. Based on my experience navigating the maze, the national security space community can do better. Many well-intentioned people want to work with new commercial entrants; they need better paths to do so. The unified national security space front door could be just what’s needed. The policy tools are in place. Success depends on whether there’s sufficient willpower to try it.

Isobel Porteous is head of business development at EarthTraq Corporation. She studied aeronautics and astronautics at Stanford University, where her thesis on space arms control verification won the William J. Perry Prize. The views in this article are her own and do not represent those of EarthTraq or any other organization.

Image: NASA via DVIDS.