Six weeks out from SATShow Week 2026, and the conversations are still going.

14,738 attendees. 100+ countries. Nearly 900 meetings were arranged through the app alone, an 81% jump year over year. By almost every measure, 2026 was our biggest and most connected event yet. But the number that stands out most? 41% of attendees were first-timers. New entrants, new programs, new money entering the sector. The industry is expanding, and Washington, DC was where it showed up.

The floor reflected the stakes of the moment. GovMilSpace drew over 5,000 attendees from defense, government, and civil space, and those conversations had a different energy this year: more candid, more operational, less theoretical. On the commercial side, 3 in 4 attendees came specifically to evaluate products and solutions, walking the hall alongside engineers and decision-makers from Northrop Grumman, L3Harris, Amazon, Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, and thousands of others. The meeting hub saw an 81% spike in requests, which tells us the industry has figured out how to use the show and is leaning in harder every year.

For 2027, March 8–11 back at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, we’re expanding the meeting hub to meet that demand, adding new pre-show targeting tools in the app, growing the Startup Pavilion, and deepening the GovMilSpace program to better serve the intelligence and allied-nations community that showed up in force this year.If you’re planning your 2027 presence, earlier is better. Prime floor space fills up fast, and early exhibitors get first selection.

See you in March!

Lindsey Fuller