Gitai, Honeybee Robotics, Northrop Grumman, Redwire Space and SpaceX are among the 14 companies selected by DARPA for sponsored “LunA-10” project involving commercial lunar infrastructure.

DARPA builds LunA-10 study for commercial lunar infrastructure

They have agreed to work together over the course of the seven-month study to design new integrated systems spanning multiple lunar services. These include lunar power; mining and commercial in-situ resource use; communications, navigation, and timing; transit, mobility, and logistics; and construction and robotics.

Specifically, they have been selected for the 10-Year Lunar Architecture (LunA-10) Capability Study, which aims to speed the setup of a future civil lunar framework, designed for both “peaceful U.S. and international use”. It aims to study the rapid development of technology concepts for “scalable systems that can operate jointly, creating monetizable services for future lunar users”.

The idea, says DARPA, is to move beyond the current paradigm of isolated, self-sufficient systems, which must support all necessary resources – such as power and communications – and “toward a future framework that emphasizes integrated models of commercial activity”.

“LunA-10 has the potential to upend how the civil space community thinks about spurring widespread commercial activity on and around the Moon within the next 10 years,” said Dr. Michael Nayak, program manager in DARPA’s Strategic Technology Office.

“LunA-10 performers include companies both big and small, domestic and international, each of which brought a clear vision and technically rigorous plan for advancing quickly towards our goal: a self-sustaining, monetizable, commercially owned-and-operated lunar infrastructure. We’re excited to get started and to share results with the lunar community at large.”

The US’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency chose: Blue Origin, CisLunar Industries, Crescent Space Services LLC, Fibertek, Firefly Aerospace, GITAI, Helios, Honeybee Robotics, ICON, Nokia of America, Northrop Grumman, Redwire Corporation, Sierra Space, and SpaceX.

Examples
GITAI’s winning proposal, for example, involves a concept for modular, multi-purpose Inchworm robots equipped with tool-changeable end effectors, which would carry out work on the lunar surface. The robots are designed to handle various tasks, from construction to maintenance and adaptation, without unnecessary duplication, says the company.

As another example, Redwire’s contribution to the LunA-10 study will focus on providing critical services to lunar assets from cislunar space, including high-speed communications and PNT (position, navigation, and timing) information.

All the companies will be due to “openly brief” their work to the lunar community, says DARPA, at the Lunar Surface Innovation Consortium (LSIC) Spring Meeting in April 2024, and then provide a final report in June 2024.

Full details on the LunA-10 Capability Study can be found on SAM.gov, an official online U.S. Government System.