KONIAG INC. INVOLVED IN KODIAK LAUNCH COMPLEX.

• Author: ORR, VANESSA

As the world moves toward a global economy, it seems natural that companies, including Native corporations, look worldwide to discover new markets. But some companies, like Koniag Inc. and its subsidiary Integrated Concepts Research Corp., are venturing even further in the search for new markets-they're looking to outer space.

ICRC, whose focus is on engineering services and advanced technology developments, is providing operations support for the Kodiak Launch Complex, a $38 million commercial spaceport located on 3,100 acres on Narrow Cape on Kodiak Island. The project, which supports both commercial and military use, has already completed two successful sub-orbital launches for the U.S. Air Force; the first orbital launch for Lockheed Martin is scheduled for this fall.

"Right now we're focused on the Kodiak Launch Complex and other aerospace opportunities in Alaska, but we'll be expanding our services in the future," explained Dave Sadlowski, ICRC's vice president, aerospace services. "ICRC intends to play an active role in growing aerospace in Alaska, but we don't see restricting ourselves to the Alaska market. We want to be able to provide services to government and commercial customers from our Alaska base. We want to be known as a provider of choice in the aerospace arena."

The Kodiak Launch Complex

In January of 1998, the Alaska Aerospace Development Corp. began building a commercial spaceport 25 miles southwest of the city of Kodiak. It is the first complete launch facility built in the United States since the 1960s, and the first not owned by the federal government. The state-of-the-art facility includes a launch control center, payload processing facility, spacecraft assembly building and launch pad.

Originally designed with commercial use in mind, the facility was built to launch objects into low earth polar or high inclination orbits. Polar orbits allow maximum coverage of the earth's surface, while high inclination orbits, used primarily for communications, allow a specific geographic region to have prolonged exposure to a satellite.

"One of the systems that Alaska Aerospace planned to service out of Kodiak was the Iridium polar orbiting system, or 'constellation of satellites,"' explained Sadlowski. "Unfortunately, the system failed to be commercially viable. That really dampened the potential for commercial low earth orbital launches out of KLC, but rocket system modernization and national missile defense became a big...