NASA released the names of nine U.S. companies which will be competing for getting the funds under NASA’s long term-moon program. The program is a private-public undertaking which aims to explore moon’s surface by developing advanced technologies.
The list includes big players in the aerospace industry like Lockheed Martin Corp., Draper, Astrobotic Technology Inc, Firefly Aerospace Inc and Moon Express. These companies will be vying for a piece of $2.6 billion under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program. Over the next ten years, some of these companies will be developing launch vehicles & robotic rovers.
Source- Reader’s Digest
NASA is soon going to begin the construction of a new space station laboratory. The new space station will orbit the moon and also act as a pit stop for other missions, mostly to deeper parts of our solar system like Mars. The construction is expected to be started as early as 2022.
At a news briefing this Thursday, NASA’s administrator Jim Bridenstine said that NASA wants to be one customer out of many customers in the robust marketplace that exists between the moon and the earth. In an earlier news release, NASA said that lunar payloads could fly on these contracted missions as early as 2019.
Source- Reuters
