Anduril Industries and satellite startup Impulse Space have been selected by the Pentagon to develop space-based interceptor technology for President Donald Trump's Golden Dome missile defense shield.

The two companies have been enlisted to develop prototypes of space-based interceptors that will track and destroy missiles from orbit, Bloomberg reported. 

Impulse Space would contribute to the project as a subcontractor to Anduril on a technology that does not yet exist.

The Golden Dome is a planned missile defense system intended to detect and destroy ballistic, hypersonic, and cruise missiles before they launch or during their flight.

Trump signed an executive order last January directing the U.S. Armed Forces to construct the Golden Dome before the end of his term. The project is expected to cost approximately $185 billion and must be operational by 2028, Trump said.

Congress has already approved roughly $25 billion for the project. The upcoming FY2027 budget proposal requests another $17.5 billion for the initiative.

US Can’t Afford It: Brookings Institution

The Brookings Institution expressed strong concerns regarding the U.S. government's proposed Golden Dome project. The Washington D.C.-based nonprofit called it a "costly and destabilizing deployment of space-based interceptors."

"At a time of growing budgetary pressures as well as increased competition with other great powers, the United States can ill afford to waste precious dollars on space-based missile defenses and a new arms race that will make us less, rather than more, secure," the institution wrote.

Space-based interceptors are among the most technologically sophisticated and costly components of the project. The U.S. would have to design, produce, and deploy these armed spacecraft, in addition to research and development expenses.

Anduril has previously been involved with developing space-based interceptors, Reuters first reported last year. 

The U.S. Space Force also awarded contracts to Northrop Grumman, True Anomaly, and Lockheed Martin, asking them to build space-based interceptor prototypes. These prototypes will be evaluated as part of the process toward awarding a final contract. That project could lead to a larger production agreement.

Price Action: Tuttle Capital Management recently launched the Tuttle Capital Space Industry Income Blast ETF (BATS:SPCI), a fund that aims to provide exposure to the fast-growing space economy with a steady stream of income.

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