NASA Picks Three Private Firms for First Commercial Moon Deliveries
NASA awards up to $253 million to Astrobotic, Intuitive Machines, and Orbit Beyond to deliver science payloads to the lunar surface. These missions pave the way for human astronauts to return to the Moon by 2024.
NASA selects Astrobotic, Intuitive Machines, and Orbit Beyond as the first private companies to deliver science and technology payloads to the Moon. Under the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program, the space agency awards up to $253 million in combined contracts to these three firms. These upcoming missions represent America's first return to the lunar surface in decades and serve as a foundational step for the Artemis program.
Each company plans to carry specific NASA instruments designed to predict lander positions, measure lunar radiation, and assist with navigation. Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic receives $79.5 million to fly up to 14 payloads to a large crater by July 2021. Houston's Intuitive Machines gets $77 million to deliver five payloads to a dark spot on the Moon in the same timeframe, while Orbit Beyond of New Jersey earns a contract to fly four payloads by September 2020.
This partnership highlights NASA's strategy to build a robust commercial space economy beyond low-Earth orbit. The selection also marks a major milestone for Astrobotic, which originally spun out of Carnegie Mellon University to compete in the Google Lunar XPRIZE. By relying on private businesses for these initial deliveries, NASA aims to lay the groundwork for sending the first woman and the next man to the Moon by 2024.