Kepler Communications announced Monday it has named Caitlin Marsh president of its U.S. subsidiary, three months after she joined the Toronto company as the unit’s vice president.
Kepler U.S., based in Sterling, Va., sells the company’s optical data relay service to American government and commercial customers. Marsh will also oversee its work on computing in orbit and on carrying other organizations’ payloads aboard Kepler spacecraft. The company has launched 33 satellites, and the first tranche of its relay network entered commercial service in August.
“Mission operators need proven optical infrastructure on orbit they can put to work today,” chief executive and co-founder Mina Mitry said in the release. “Kepler has established global leadership in optical data relay, and Caitlin will lead our efforts to bring those capabilities to more U.S. customers.”
Marsh came to Kepler in July from Auterion, the drone-autonomy company, where she was senior director of global operations. The release says she set up a U.S. production line that took an international security program from award to delivery in six months. She was earlier vice president of product at SpiderOak, which makes cybersecurity software for space operations, and held strategy and advanced-programs roles at Ball Aerospace. At In-Q-Tel, the not-for-profit investor that backs technology for the U.S. intelligence community, she managed a portfolio of 12 companies. She holds an aerospace engineering degree from the University of Maryland and a master’s in systems engineering from George Washington University.
Marsh said her priority is “to accelerate adoption across government and commercial programs,” adding: “We will drive that expansion by growing our U.S. organization, strengthening industry partnerships, and putting Kepler’s capabilities to work on our customers’ most demanding missions.”
Marsh replaces Robert Conrad who held the job before her. Conrad had been with Kepler Communications US Inc since Jan 2023 and was promoted to president of Kepler U.S. in November 2024 after two years running its business development. In that stretch the subsidiary won a place on the Space Development Agency’s HALO contract vehicle for prototype missions, and a Kepler satellite later passed an air-to-space laser link test for the agency. Conrad is now president and COO of Solstar Space Co.
Marsh takes over as Kepler lines up its next expansion of its relay network. The company has booked a dedicated Rocket Lab Neutron launch and 10 satellites on Portal Space Systems’ Motus Via Sol mission, both aimed at a 2028 build-out the release says will bring laser links of up to 100 gigabits per second and more room for hosted payloads.