Startup Intuitive Machines Wins $4.8 Billion NASA Contract

Intuitive Machines established itself as one of the most exciting “new” space companies taking advantage of the changing space business, which is pivoting away from traditional, slow-moving big tech partners to embracing collaboration with startups. In February the company’s Odysseus lander pulled off a spectacular double-success with the first successful touchdown on the lunar surface by a U.S. lander since the Apollo era, which also made it the first private lunar lander to succeed.

Now Intuitive Machines‘ role in the future of lunar exploration seems even more solid. NASA revealed it’s just awarded the small company a $4.82 billion contract to develop lunar relay systems as part of the Near Space Network, the agency’s plan to build an advanced communications and navigation system to help future Moon missions.

The contract has a starting period of five years, though it could be extended until 2034, and $4.82 billion is technically the maximum that could be awarded to the company. News site TechCrunch notes that the order technically only guarantees an award of $150 million, but this sounds like more than enough for a smallish company to get going on a big project.

The award requires Intuitive to build a constellation of satellites and systems to create a powerful, speedy radio network around the Moon, with a focus on the geologically interesting South Pole region, NASA’s press release explains. Traditional direct-line communications in this area aren’t possible, NASA notes, and it’s where the future Artemis lunar missions will go. 

NASA also says that the relay it’s asking Intuitive to create will pull double duty as a “position, navigation and timing” system, which is “crucial for ensuring the safety of navigation on and around the lunar surface,” not just for NASA’s lunar missions, but also for other third-party customer missions in the “near space region.” 

Basically, NASA’s wants a 21st century digital communications system to surpass the crackly voiced, low-data radio signals that were sent to and from the Moon during the Apollo missions. It’s also asking for a form of Moon-based “GPS,” which is critical to ensure highly accurate future landings on the lunar surface, as well as enabling astronauts and robotic systems like rovers to explore different features on and under the lunar surface.

The “timing” requirement is also interesting, and vibes with recent news that the National Institute of Standards and Technology has published a new standard for “Moon time,” because keeping accurate track of time on the Moon is a tricky problem, especially because since our rocky, dusty satellite has very different day/night cycles than Earth, and Moon missions will need to keep track of this. 

Intuitive Machine’s Odysseus lander was only a partial success, failing over slightly after touching down, but it clearly proved to NASA that the company is up to the very difficult task of designing and engineering hardware destined for orbiting around the Moon.

The company has also won several earlier NASA contracts, including a $116.9 million contract awarded in August to deliver six science and technology payloads to the Moon’s south pole. It’s also in the running to design a next-generation lunar rover–meaning though future astronauts are going to be landing on the Moon on a commercially supplied Starship rocket from Elon Musk’s SpaceX as part of the Artemis program, they won’t probably be racing around on its surface, kicking up some dust in a special Moon-modified Tesla. ​