NASA chooses nine companies to bid on the Moon

WASHINGTON: The US Space Agency announced on Thursday (November 29th) that nine private companies, mostly start-ups, would bid for US $ 2.6 billion worth of contracts for the construction of spacecraft intended for carry payloads on the moon as early as 2019.

This move is part of NASA's goal of sending people to the moon over the next decade, for the first time since the Apollo era of the 1960s-1970s.

NASA's director, Jim Bridenstine, called the announcement "tangible progress in returning America to the surface of the moon to stay."

The only known name of the group is the aerospace giant Lockheed Martin, who has a long history of success with NASA and has built the InSight lander that landed on Monday on Mars.

The others are Astrobotic Technology, Inc.; Deep space systems; Drape; Firefly Aerospace, Inc .; Intuitive Machines, LLC; Masten Space Systems, Inc .; Moon Express; and orbit beyond.

"Lunar payload commercial contracts are indefinite-term, indeterminate-quantity contracts with a maximum contract value of $ 2.6 billion over the next ten years," said a NASA statement.

NASA has not given details on the bidding process, except to say that it will review a number of factors when comparing bids, such as the technical feasibility, price and timing ".

This decision marks a radical change in the way NASA operates with respect to the Moon's aspirations in the United States – although private companies have been used for years to transport gear to the International Space Station, and SpaceX and Boeing are working on spacecraft to transport astronauts to the moon. from 2019.

Instead of running a government-funded space program like Apollo, the US Space Agency will purchase services, essentially becoming a customer for private companies that build their own spacecraft.

The approach will allow NASA to reduce costs, said Bridenstine.

Earlier this year, NASA canceled its only robotic vehicle under development to explore the surface of the Moon, known as the Resource Prospector (RP) mission.

The vehicle had been in development for about a decade to explore a polar region of the moon.

In 2017, President Donald Trump announced that the United States would send people back to the lunar surface, which would be a milestone on the way to sending people to Mars by 2030.

NASA's current plan is to begin by sending gear to the moon and building a lunar station in orbit from 2022.

By 2023, the first rocket would carry astronauts around the Moon, in an orbit even more distant than the Apollo missions.

According to NASA, astronauts should not land on the moon until the end of the 2020s.