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Stellar Solutions was exceedingly proud to receive a letter of appreciation by US Air Force Academy Commandant of Cadets Brigadier General Paul Moga for our role in preparing his cadets for one of the greatest responsibilities in their military careers – conflicts in active duty. To deliver the premier quality training our troops deserve, Punch Moulton, our VP of Defense Support and Cyber Strategies (and a retired Major General), brought together an outstanding team of Stellar Advisors: Major General (ret) Duane Jones, RADM (ret) Dan Lloyd and Major General (ret) Pete Fesler. They are among the 80+ Stellar Advisors of top military experts and government officials who distinguish our ability to serve our clients. Brigadier General Moga’s recognition is particularly significant because he commands the 4,300-member Cadet Wing and more than 200 Air Force and civilian personnel. He guides the military training, leadership and character development, Basic Cadet Training, and Expeditionary Skills Training for the Cadet Wing. With a deep determination towards their success, Moulton’s team contributed personal time over the weekends to facilitate a series of sophisticated exercises addressing the opportunities and challenges of careers in the Air Force and Space Force.  Some examples:

• Jones facilitated maintenance, logistics, security forces, and medical exercises.
• Lloyd led the cadets’ planning and then role-played the President of the United States as the cadets delivered a “National Security Council” decision brief.
• Fesler and Moulton ran a high-end examination of “Integrated Air and Missile Defense,” that in Brigadier General Moga’s words, “began with a PhD-level look at Defense Design and then led the cadets through a challenging simulation of ballistic and cruise missile attacks.”

Stellar Solutions CEO Janet Grondin said, “We were extremely proud to have Punch, Duane, Dan, and Pete sharing their wisdom with our future Air and Space leaders.  Stellar Advisors help shape our future by training tomorrow’s decision-makers today.” See these photos from the Air Force Academy showing the Stellar Advisor team in action during the Integrated Air and Missile Defense simulations. ]>

Palo Alto, CA, November 14, 2022 – Stellar Solutions, Inc., the global aerospace engineering services leader, has named Dr. Agnès Lahure-Lecompte as Director of Stellar Solutions Aerospace France (SSAF).  Dr. Lahure-Lecompte joins SSAF after 28 years in the industry, 21 of those with Airbus Defence & Space, where she held numerous critical management and business development positions. Stellar Solutions Aerospace France is engaged across the global market for satellite communications, remote sensing, launch, and on-orbit capabilities.

Dr. Lahure-Lecompte was most recently Proposal Manager for EUTELSAT 36X, a multi-beam satellite for broadcast and telecommunications services, at Airbus Defence & Space. Prior to that, she was the company’s Program Manager for Inmarsat 6 F2, served as Head of Payload Engineering from 2016 -2017, and managed launch campaigns for AMU1 and EB9B/EDRS-A on the Proton rocket. Earlier in her career, she worked at Thales Alenia Space and Aerospatiale as an antenna software manager.

“Dr. Lehure-Lecompte is a proven leader in the aerospace industry with the experience to take our global customers to the next level of performance.  Under her leadership, Stellar Solutions Aerospace France will support manufacturing and deployment of critical space capabilities that connect and inform friends and allies across the globe,” said Stellar Solutions CEO Janet Grondin.   
  
Dr. Lahure-Lecompte earned her Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Université Bordeaux I in 1997 while working on ionic propulsion at Airbus, formerly Matra Marconi Space, in the Mathematics Methods and Analysis Software Development Department.

SSAF is owned by Stellar Solutions, Inc. and is part of a constellation of companies operating seamlessly to serve customers across global markets. Together with Stellar Solutions Aerospace Limited, based in the United Kingdom, SSAF represents the International sector of Stellar Solutions and is one of the “five points of the star” that also include commercial, defense, intelligence, and civil sectors. 

About Stellar Solutions, Inc.:  Stellar Solutions, Inc. is a global aerospace and systems engineering services provider to commercial, defense, intelligence, civil and international sectors.  Stellar Solutions provides systems engineering capabilities and strategic support for global communications, remote sensing, national defense, and space exploration. These solutions to customer critical needs connect technology and customers across multiple domains. With physical operations throughout the U.S. and around the globe, Stellar Solutions is a recognized leader in delivering end-to-end critical expertise and problem-solving skills. https://www.stellarsolutions.com/

Palo Alto, CA, October 14 – QuakeFinder, Stellar Solutions’ earthquake forecasting research initiative, and Google Research have published a study in American Geophysical Union’s (AGU) Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth that advances the pursuit of predictive data in alerting the public to impending earthquakes. The team identified a signal of modest but statistically significant size in the days immediately preceding intermediate to large earthquakes in California.  The full publication of Case-Control Study on a Decade of Ground-Based Magnetometers in California Reveals Modest Signal 24–72 hr Prior to Earthquakes can be viewed at https://doi.org/10.1029/2022JB024109 .

“Data science and artificial intelligence are giving scientists new tools to understand the physical world.  We are excited that our research combined with Stellar Solutions’ unique magnetometer recordings is hinting at previously unknown physical phenomena in earthquake forecasting,” said Jason Miller, Product Management Director for Google Applied Science.

The Google Applied Sciences team led the effort, designed the study, and performed the analysis with exceptional rigor. Quakefinder, the humanitarian R&D division of Stellar Solutions, provided the data and verified the findings.

“This study provides important evidence that a physical change can be observed in the days before an earthquake. While we still have much work to do in identifying stronger signals, this research supports our vision that earthquake forecasting using the magnetic field may one day be possible,” said Dan Schneider, QuakeFinder’s Director of Research and Development.

QuakeFinder, which is seeking to ultimately save lives by forecasting earthquakes, has collected data since 2005 using over 150 stations around the world. Their high-resolution magnetometer recordings have captured thousands of earthquakes (M3.0 or greater) to support their work in developing algorithms to analyze these signals.

This is the second study that has evaluated the QuakeFinder California dataset and the second one to find a statistically significant correlation between activity in the magnetic field and earthquakes days later.  In 2019, QuakeFinder published the first comprehensive evaluation of this dataset in Computers and Geosciences: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cageo.2019.104317.  This used single station data and different algorithms but the same data set and found statistical correlations prior to quakes greater than M4.

The second study (by Google) achieved a Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) of 0.5 when comparing the magnetic data recorded 24-72 hours before earthquakes (greater than magnitude 4.5) to data recorded earlier. A supplemental analysis added a compensation factor for the average global magnetic activity and this boosted the SNR from 0.5 to 0.96. As an SNR of 1 or greater is typically considered a compelling result in the physical sciences, this analysis points toward the magnetic field being a valuable source of information in the earthquake forecasting process.

The study employed a number of strategies to ensure rigor. One was to combine signals from pairs of stations to guard against noise that might pollute the data at a single station, such as automobile traffic, construction and other human activity near the station’s location. Another strategy was to control for variations across different stations, locations and geologies by using a case-control construction in which data from station pairs close to an earthquake (~30km) are compared to other time periods from the same station pair. These strategies help to eliminate false positives.

“As a next step in our research, when correcting for global magnetic activity, we can look to use actual high resolution remote station data provided by QuakeFinder rather than the low resolution global average provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, as it may allow the signal to become even more apparent,” Schneider added.  He noted that this study was conducted on data collected in California; and its results cannot be assumed for other fault types or geologic conditions. 

Stellar Solutions is a Malcolm Baldrige Award-winning company that for 27 years has solved some of the most complex systems engineering problems, from national security to space exploration, across commercial and government sectors. Founder Celeste Ford’s vision, satisfying customer critical needs while realizing employee dream jobs, led to the creation of QuakeFinder in 2001.

Stellar Solutions has invested over $30-million in the QuakeFinder program, augmented by partial grants from NASA, the U.S. Department of Defense, PG&E and the Musk Foundation.  The initiative has drawn on the expertise of leading aerospace organizations like NASA, geoscientists from Stanford University and University of California at Berkeley, Stellar Solutions’ own systems engineers, and partners around the world including from Peru, Taiwan and Greece. Originally inspired by Stanford research after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake in California, QuakeFinder founder Tom Bleier devised the idea of placing sensors underground every 20 miles close to the fault trace to capture pre-seismic electromagnetic disturbances.

“The QuakeFinder/Google team is very proud to have advanced the state of earthquake forecasting and we look forward to a global effort to build on this important work and save lives,” Ford said.

About Stellar Solutions, Inc.:  Stellar Solutions, Inc. is a global aerospace and systems engineering services provider to commercial, defense, intelligence, civil and international sectors.  Stellar Solutions provides systems engineering capabilities and strategic support for global communications, remote sensing, national defense, and space exploration. These solutions to customer critical needs connect technology and customers across multiple domains. With physical operations throughout the U.S. and around the globe, Stellar Solutions is a recognized leader in delivering end-to-end critical expertise and problem-solving skills. https://www.stellarsolutions.com/

Palo Alto, CA – Janet Grondin, CEO of Stellar Solutions, Inc., a global leader in aerospace engineering services, will receive the Leadership Award from Women in Aerospace (WIA) at the organization’s 37^th Awards Dinner & Ceremony on October 13, 2022.  Grondin is being recognized for her exemplary leadership in advancing opportunities for women to attain successful careers in aerospace.

“As the leading organization dedicated to expanding women’s opportunities in the aerospace community, WIA is pleased to bestow Janet Grondin with the Leadership Award,” said WIA Chair Bridget Chatman. “She has encouraged women to compete for significant opportunities in our field, leading to outstanding contributions in the public and private sectors.”  

Grondin has led a distinguished three-decade career spanning military service, a publicly-traded corporation, and now an innovative woman-owned and led company.  Stellar Solutions is a Malcolm Baldrige Award-winning company serving the defense, intelligence, civil, commercial and international sectors.  Building on the company’s founding vision, Grondin is forging new ways to meet customers’ critical needs while placing employees in their “dream jobs.”

“Stellar Solutions is extraordinarily proud that Janet Grondin is being honored for cultivating opportunities for women at every stage of the pipeline.  She ensures that they are not only in their dream jobs today but will reach for the stars in their future,” said Celeste Ford, Founder and Board Chair of Stellar Solutions.

A key strategy in positioning the company for future success is upholding the company’s core values of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging (DEIB). Of the eight senior leadership positions at Stellar Solutions, 50% are held by women and 25% by people of color. The company has an active DEIB network.

Grondin’s prior senior leadership roles at Stellar Solutions include Vice President of Intelligence Programs and Vice President of Defense Programs. She joined the company in 2018, after serving at Northrop Grumman Corporation as Director of Overhead Persistent Infrared Exploitation Systems and Operations Manager of MILSATCOM and National Program ground systems.

A Colonel in the U.S. Air Force, Grondin received numerous military decorations, including Legion of Merit, prior to retiring in 2015. Her eminent 26-year career spanned leadership and technical roles with significant expertise in command, acquisition, program management, and systems engineering for space and ground systems. She is known for encouraging her team members to take initiative and lead missions, characteristics that have helped propel them to important military and civilian roles in the US Government.

Grondin has been selected for numerous industry awards to include the Chancellor’s Alumni award at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Outstanding Program Director of the Year by the Air Force Associations’ Schriever Chapter, the National Reconnaissance Office Director’s Circle Award, and the Arthur S. Flemming Award for outstanding Government service. 

Grondin’s education includes a B.S. in Aeronautical Engineering (magna cum laude) from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, an M.S. in Aeronautical Engineering from the AF Institute of Technology, an M.S. in Strategic Studies from Air War College, and an M.S. in Military Operational Art & Science from Air Command and Staff College. In 2019, she earned her credentials as a California Awards for Performance Excellence (CAPE) Examiner.

She is former President of the Women In Defense Greater Los Angeles Chapter, and is the current East Coast Space Division Chair for the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA), and an NDIA Los Angeles Chapter Executive Board member.

About Stellar Solutions, Inc.:  Stellar Solutions, Inc. is a global aerospace and systems engineering services provider to commercial, defense, intelligence, civil and international sectors.  Stellar Solutions provides systems engineering capabilities and strategic support for global communications, remote sensing, national defense, and space exploration. These solutions to customer critical needs connect technology and customers across multiple domains. With physical operations throughout the U.S. and the globe, Stellar Solutions is a recognized leader in delivering end-to-end critical expertise and problem-solving skills. https://www.stellarsolutions.com/

Woman-led venture capital firm funds early-stage mission driven space technologies, leveraging unique technical and due diligence expertise in the aerospace sector.

Palo Alto, CA – Stellar Ventures launched its first fund, SV Andromeda Fund LP, which recently held its final closing with over $23M in capital commitments and the mission to invest in the future of space technology. Drawing on the extensive network and technical expertise of aerospace engineering partner Stellar Solutions, Inc., Stellar Ventures is uniquely positioned to identify leading terrestrial and orbital space technology companies in early growth stages.

Investing in space start-ups reached nearly $15-billion in 2021 (Bryce Tech, 2022). The roughly $350-billion global space market could surge to over $1 trillion by 2040 according to Morgan Stanley’s Space Team estimate with strategic public-private partnerships producing innovative, integrated solutions.

“We are standing at the precipice of exponential growth in the space industry, similar to the Internet in the late 1990s,” said Managing Director Celeste Ford. “Amazon, Google and Netflix were built upon the Internet’s foundation. In today’s space industry, the commodification of space launch has led to a similar dynamic, with a new set of entrepreneurs rapidly bringing innovative products to market. Stellar Ventures is investing in promising entrepreneurs who are capitalizing on these opportunities to build the space companies of tomorrow.”

A pioneering aerospace engineer, Ford founded Stellar Solutions in 1995 and led it as CEO until ascending to Board Chair in 2018. She founded Stellar Ventures in 2022 with Managing Director Matt Patterson and Operating Partner David Anderman. 

“No other venture fund in the space industry has a partner like Stellar Solutions,” said Patterson, “Stellar Solutions identifies deal flow, performs our due diligence and introduces entrepreneurs to government customers where their products can directly impact US and international missions.”

Stellar Solutions specializes in high end systems engineering, serving intelligence, defense, civil, commercial and international space customers. Stellar Solutions’ more than 300 employees include an impressive roster of Stellar Solutions Advisors who are accomplished leaders with experience in national security (e.g., Generals, Admirals, SES – Senior Executive Service, Ambassadors), former astronauts, and scientific/engineering experts serving the defense, intelligence, commercial, civil and international sectors.

“Stellar Ventures is committed to identifying successful investments for its limited partners and fueling the development of space-enabled technologies to achieve ambitious business, government and environmental goals,” said Anderman, who is the former General Counsel of SpaceX and previously served as the Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel of Lucasfilm Ltd.

“Engineers are creating the next generation of space startups and can prove out their technology on orbit for a fraction of what it cost just a few years ago,” he added. “What was once the realm of science fiction is now reality as humanity expands into the cosmos.”

Space-enabled technology allows Fortune 500 companies to monitor crop production and supply chains, and governments to manage cyber security and warfighter support.  As expressed in the 2021 United States Space Priorities Framework, “Space activities are essential to our way of life. They advance our understanding of the Earth, the universe, and humanity; enable U.S. national security; create good jobs and economic opportunity; enhance our health and well-being; and inspire us to pursue our dreams.”

About Stellar Ventures

Stellar Ventures is a woman-led venture capital firm investing in the next generation of space entrepreneurs. With the launch of their first fund, SV Andromeda Fund LP, the Stellar Ventures team will invest in early-stage, mission driven space technology companies, leveraging their technical expertise and network in the aerospace sector.  Stellar Ventures is partnering with extraordinary leaders who are utilizing space technology to build exceptional businesses that will change the world.

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About Stellar Solutions

Stellar Solutions, Inc. is a global aerospace and systems engineering services provider to commercial, defense, intelligence, civil and international sectors.  Stellar Solutions provides systems engineering capabilities and strategic support for global communications, remote sensing, national defense, and space exploration. These solutions to customer critical needs connect technology and customers across multiple domains. With physical operations throughout the U.S. and the globe, Stellar Solutions is a recognized leader in delivering end-to-end critical expertise and problem-solving skills.

stellarsolutions.com