Goal Is To Demonstrate Robotic Lunar Landing Missions

NASA has issued delivery orders to three companies as part of its Innovative Lunar Demonstrations Data (ILDD) project. Each order is worth $500,000 and will help develop vehicle capabilities and demonstrate end-to-end robotic lunar landing missions.

The three companies selected are:

• Astrobotic Technology Inc., Pittsburgh, PA.
• Dynetics Inc., Huntsville, AL.
• Moon Express Inc., San Francisco, CA.

All three companies are pariticpating in the Google Lunar X-Prize. These companies are among six that received ILDD contract awards in October. After issuing the ILDD Broad Agency Announcement, NASA awarded six firm-fixed price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contracts, with a potential total value for all awarded contracts of up to $30.1 million during a period of up to five years.

After those awards, each ILDD contractor submitted System Definition Review (SDR) packages, in which they identified their top risks. NASA invited the ILDD contractors in November to propose task plans for the delivery of data associated with a critical component demonstration test that addresses one or more of the SDR risk items. In response to the delivery orders NASA is now issuing, each of the three selected companies is expected to provide data capturing these results.

The ILDD contracts also provide for issuing subsequent delivery orders that will specify data associated with system testing and integration, launch, in-space maneuvers, braking burns, lunar landing and other enhanced capabilities. Knowledge acquired from this data will be applied to the development of lander systems necessary to execute human and robotic missions to the moon, near-Earth asteroids or other solar system destinations. The data also will contribute to NASA's efforts to enable affordable and sustainable space exploration.

The ILDD contracts are being managed by the Exploration Missions and Systems Office at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

FMI: www.nasa.gov