In less than three years, Virginia-based defense, intelligence and infrastructure conglomerate Parsons has become a major player among Colorado Springs military contractors.

Parsons wins $185 million Space Force contract in Colorado Springs

The company employs 900 locally after buying Braxton Science & Technology Group in October for $300 million and Polaris Alpha for $489 million in 2018 — and Parsons plans to continue growing during the next year.

Edward Baron, senior vice president of Parsons’ space and geospatial operations in Colorado Springs, said the company is trying to fill more than 50 openings locally, mostly for software engineers and cyber security specialists, and likely will hit 1,000 Colorado Springs employees sometime next year.

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“We are adding employees in Colorado Springs constantly, and some of the contracts we have won have us adding more staff over time,” Baron said. “Colorado is an extremely important business area for Parsons with all of the growth we are seeing in space. We are helping to create the future. Colorado is a great place to live and work, and we are continuing to support and invest in the local community.”

Colorado Springs company wins $100 million contract — its biggest ever

Much of Parsons’ growth in Colorado Springs during the next few years will come from two major contracts the company has landed in the past year:

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• The company’s local operation won a contract in October valued up to $185 million from the U.S. Space Force to support its Integrated Solutions for Situational Awareness software system. The one-year award includes four one-year options to continue and expand the company’s work on the system that began 14 years ago for the government-owned software package used by more than 5,000 people at Department of Defense and federal civilian agencies to create software code, applications and modules.

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• Braxton also won a $139.4 million contract modification from the Air Force in July for satellite operations; building prototypes; integration for support and delivery, network, infrastructure and hardware; and related work. Braxton won the original $19.9 million contract two years ago for ground services satellite operations, building prototypes and integration. The three-year modified deal has a potential value totaling nearly $234 million if all options are exercised.

The sky is not a limit to satellite company

The latest contract builds on work Parsons is already doing to move satellite ground tracking and control systems into cloud platforms. The company will help the military shift from custom-designed and -built software and hardware systems for each satellite to a highly automated cloud-based system that will control many satellites. The new system will cut the costs of controlling satellites as the military shifts to using networks of smaller, less expensive satellites.

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Just a few small classified satellite networks are using the cloud system now, but Baron said the Department of Defense hopes to move all of its satellites to the new system by 2028. Under the planned shift, the military also plans to expand from government-owned antennas to also using commercial antennas for satellite tracking, also designed to reduce the cost of tracking a much larger number of smaller satellites.