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Steve Altemus is optimistic. As CEO of Intuitive Machines, which made history with the first successful moon landing by a private company, he has good reason. But this was just the opening chapter of his company’s plans to build “a complete kit: all the pieces you need to build missions to the moon, on the moon, and around the moon.”
Intuitive Machines is uniquely positioned to support lunar missions and ultimately the lunar economy, not just as a contractor for NASA or the Pentagon but as a full-fledged commercial space services company, Altimus explained in an interview with TechCrunch.
Intuitive Machines recently received the sole award for a multi-billion-dollar satellite communications services contract, meaning it will be the company that will provide high-bandwidth communications for Artemis and any other mission that goes that way.
“This is huge,” Ultimus said. “Now we have a third leg of stool to support the company.”
“We had the CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) contract, which was the delivery service; then we have the LTV (Lunar Terrain Vehicle) contract, which is infrastructure as a service. The middle part is really the data transfer and analytics, with this lunar data Commercial for Artemis – If you think about it, we now have a platform for the lunar economy and we are able to do this as a commercial supplier of these services.
The alternative has historically been “cool” systems, and expensive one-off missions such as the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. Technically stunning – but with nine-figure price tags. Increasingly, government, civilian and military agents have chosen more economical means of accomplishing the same thing; Perhaps the best example of this is the use of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Dragon capsules to transport astronauts to and from the International Space Station – a previously more difficult and expensive task.
Interestingly, Altemus credited a misunderstanding with the current extent of its technology stack.
“When NASA first gave us the CLPS award, we had a misunderstanding. We thought they said, ‘Fly to the moon and bring back data for us, and you’re not allowed to use the deep space network.'” It turns out they are He was They were allowed to use the DSN, but they operated under that restriction anyway. “We had to, starting in 2019, create a network to communicate from Earth to the Moon to our lander and back. So we necessarily had to figure out that efficiency, and we had to go into the communications and navigation areas to overcome the regulatory hurdles.”
The result is that the company ended up with a solution that was much more powerful than was strictly necessary, but that put it in pole position for the lunar communications contract – which it easily won as the sole provider.
Many would think that SpaceX, with its massive Starlink satellite constellation, would be a natural fit for providing space communications services. But although there are superficial similarities (sending radio signals from space), these are very different problems that are being solved.
“When you think about lunar communications, it’s a completely different physics issue,” Altimus explained. “Environments have to be understood, distances and situations have to be understood. We’ve worked on transits to the Moon, in lunar orbit, on the surface of the Moon, using a bunch of commercial ground stations, dozens of radio astronomy-sized dishes in different countries. And when you think about building a lander on The surface of the moon, it’s a more complex machine than a satellite orbiting the moon, so the talent is already inside the house.
Although the lunar communications contract is Intuitive Machines’ newest and most important, the Lunar Terrain rover – the new Moon Buggy – is certainly the easiest for ordinary people to appreciate. The company is teaming up with AVL, Boeing, Michelin and Northrop Grumman, competing with teams led by Lunar Outpost and Astrolab. The contract is not just for Builds A new lunar module but operational and supported for 10 years; As Altimus points out, this makes it much more than just a rover design task.
“If you think about it, this is the first piece of commercial infrastructure on the moon that has to be run autonomously. You may be fascinated by the buggy, but you still have to provide service.” As a company, IM is the only company in the group that has The lander to deliver the LTV, the LTV itself as a vehicle, and the communications and navigation systems to operate autonomously on the Moon. The company is very well prepared for this.”
Not that building a lunar rover isn’t exciting in itself, but he was quick to add.
“The three companies are building a mock-up on Earth for proper checks and evaluations with human astronauts: how well your design is suitable for descent, removing and replacing equipment, and how to operate and drive it,” Altimus said. “It’s funny — we had astronauts testing, and two of them actually walked on the moon. When I heard about the Moon Buggy, how it worked, what it was like and what the soil was like… I’ll tell you, it was amazing.”
Intuitive machines are not on their way to becoming the new pioneer; Traditional cost-plus-prize-based procurement methods are giving way to fixed-price contracts with a built-in long tail of services and support. “Can (primes) operate in that environment? The key to US competitiveness is to move faster; it is speed and agility that allow companies like IM to succeed, while traditional airlines have found it difficult to adapt.”
With 400 people and counting, Intuitive Machines is still relatively small, but it’s hiring quickly. It’s based in Houston for a reason. “When I left NASA and walked out the doors of the Johnson Space Center, one of the main things I decided was that this was a great place to build a company: outside of the human spaceflight center,” Altimus said. “The talent pool in this area is unmatched.” Believe it, we’re hiring from all over the country, but the situation here is engaging. They see the company culture and energy, and they can feel what it means to win.
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