NASA Teams Up with Three Tech Startups for Lunar Mission Vehicle Development: Here’s the Lowdown

NASA has selected four companies – Intuitive Machines, Lunar Outpost and Venturi Astrolabe – to develop the Lunar Terrain Vehicle (LTV) that the Artemis astronauts will use to travel around the lunar surface. NASA said in a statement that the vehicle will help conduct scientific research during the agency’s Artemis mission to the Moon and in preparation for human missions to Mars. “We look forward to the development of the Artemis generation lunar exploration vehicle to help advance what we learn on the Moon,” said Vanessa Wyche, director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

“This vehicle will greatly enhance our astronauts’ ability to explore and conduct science on the lunar surface while also serving as a science platform between crewed missions,” Wyche added. The US space agency intends to begin using LTV for crewed operations during Artemis V. Contracts with “firm-fixed-price task orders” have a combined maximum potential value of $4.6 billion for all awards. Each provider will begin with a feasibility work order, a one-year specialized study to develop a system that meets NASA’s requirements through the initial design maturity project phase.

Between Artemis missions, when the crew is not on the Moon, the LTV will operate remotely to support NASA’s scientific objectives as needed. Outside of that time, the provider will have the ability to use their LTVs for commercial lunar surface activities unrelated to NASA missions, the space agency said. “We will use the LTV to travel to places we cannot reach on foot, increasing our ability to make new scientific discoveries,” said Jacob Bleicher, chief exploration scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. Through Artemis, NASA will send astronauts — including the first woman, the first person of color and its first international partner astronaut — to explore the moon.