Ampcontrol and Newcastle's LeoLabs in $240-million bid to build Low Earth Orbit space radar systems for global system

The radars would also have defence importance, with the US company LeoLabs describing the technology as "vitally important to Australia and its allies' national interest".

The Australian arm of US-based LeoLabs Inc and electrical engineering group Ampcontrol are the leaders of the consortium behind the Australian Space Radar Project (ASRP), which is seeking $80 million in federal funding to add to the $160 million already raised by private sector investment.

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Prime Minister Scott Morrison was at Ampcontrol on Monday. If the grant from his government's Modern Manufacturing Initiative (MMI) succeeds, the ASRP consortium would build two new manufacturing plants - one in the Hunter, the other at Jerrambomberra in Queenbeyan - with as many as 80 of an estimated 200 new jobs to be here.

LeoLabs plans another 25 or so jobs in Newcastle, and the Australian-made products would be used in a growing global network of LeoLabs radars.

LeoLabs Australia is led by former Williamtown RAAF squadron commander and Iraq War veteran, Air Commodore Terry van Haren, whose 35 years of service finished with a term as Australia's Air and Space Attache to the US, leading the Australian Embassy's "inter-agency space working group" in its work with the US Space Force.

LeoLabs began in 2016 as a "space-tech" startup building a global network of at least 10 ground-based radars to provide high-resolution data on objects in low Earth orbit (LEO)" for the growing number of industries relying on satellite services.

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Other partners in the radar project are ResTech - a joint venture between Ampcontrol and the University of Newcastle, circuit-board maker Lintek and electronics firm SRX Global.

Mr van Haren said yesterday that LeoLabs was part of a burgeoning industry of private space companies, such as Elon Musk's SpaceX.

He said more than 18,000 objects had been identified in low earth orbit (160km to 2000km) from about 250,000 objects from golf-ball size up, all of them man-made.

In its pitch to customers, the LeoLabs parent company says it aims to "address a new generation of risks and opportunities" in low earth orbit as "commercial space ventures and newly formed space agencies from every corner of the globe compete for their place in the emerging LEO economy".

Mr van Haren said he wanted to bring LeoLabs to the Hunter after spending "about half" of his RAAF career at Williamtown.

Mr van Haren's efforts were endorsed yesterday by the chairman of the Defence Hunter industrial taskforce, Tim Owen, who spent 32 years in the RAAF before entering NSW parliament as the Liberal MP for Newcastle.

Mr Owen said the LeoLabs announcement was "a huge commitment" into the region, giving us our first opportunity to build on the "space" side of the aerospace industry.

"This technology is strategically vital to Australia's and its allies' national security and will provide a sovereign space surveillance capability for government and commercial enterprises that can track every object in every orbit in real-time in Australia's sphere of interest," Mr Owen said.

In September, Defence Minister Melissa Price announced "space" as one of four new "sovereign industrial capability priorities (SICPs)" for the Australian Defence Force.

Describing Australia as "increasingly reliant on satellite-based systems, services and capabilities", Ms Price said government grant funding would help Defence "acquire projects" and contribute to "the capability needs of our international partners".

Mr Owen endorsed the importance of the global radar network to military intelligence, saying it "provides an opportunity to understand what is going up into space and what is already in low earth orbit".

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In a statement outlining its plans, LeoLabs said that if its bid for manufacturing assistance was successful, the consortium had the potential to export more than $400 million of equipment over seven years.

Confirming the importance of the radar arrays to military intelligence, LeoLabs said: "This technology is strategically vital to Australia's and its allies' national security and will provide a sovereign space surveillance capability for government and commercial enterprises that can track every object in every orbit in real-time in Australia's sphere of interest."

There would be two new Australian radars should the manufacturing grant succeed.

One would "capture 'medium inclination' launches out of the Asian continent" while a deep space radar would maintain "neighbourhood watch" in the Indian Pacific's geostationary orbit belt.

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The low earth orbit radar would be in the Northern Territory and the deep space radar in northern Western Australia.

The chief executive of the Space Industry Association of Australia, James Brown, said the proposal and the level of funding were "significant" and would "dramatically increase Australia's ability to be a player in the global space situational awareness market".

Mr van Haren confirmed the project partners had submitted an expression of interest for the Commonwealth funding. He said LeoLabs had "a long-term commitment to Australia" and had committed to build the WA space radar.

"If LeoLabs is successful in its funding application, the ASRP will be the largest investment by a foreign company into Australia's space industry in decades, both in licensing and production as well as investment," Mr van Haren said, referring to the US parent company.

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