Get ready to set off towards the new generation! Following Intuitive Machines’ (LUNR) successful Moon landing in February, the space exploration company is partnering with NASA along with Boeing (BA) and Northrop Grumman (NOC) to develop a new Lunar Lander (LTV).
Intuitive Machines President and CEO Steve Altmus sits down with Yahoo Finance’s Akiko Fujita at the 2024 Milken Conference to talk about some of the regulatory risks in expanding into commercial space projects, as well as the company’s latest plans and excitement around lunar vehicles.
“We designed and developed a mission to the Moon for a price tag of about $118 million and did it in about four years. We completely disrupted the industry in terms of the economics of flying to the Moon. It’s an accomplishment,” Altmus said about Intuitive Machines’ work with NASA “On the way to the Moon, 300,000 miles away, you look at how we executed the mission, despite all the challenges and challenges. And we solved every problem on the way there,” he says.
Catch more coverage from Yahoo Finance at the 2024 Milken Institute Global Conference.
This article was written by: Luke Carberry Mogan.
video transcript
I’m here at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles for the Dairy Institute Global Conference. We are talking about space exploration and the new space economy. We went here with me. He is the founder, CEO and president of a company. machine. Good conversations with you today. A very timely conversation here, given today’s announcement or what we’re looking at today. Potentially, Boeing is launching the first flight to the international space station with its crew. They’re one of your partners going forward. LTV.But I’m curious how you view this in the context of the positives for beginners like you. Although you probably wouldn’t call yourself a startup and then Legacy Space company. It’s been a bit of a journey. Yes, I would say it’s been a journey for both of us, right? We actually started our business in the Boeing Space Research Building, believe it or not, and I have good relationships with them and I’m really proud. First of all, I have to say that because of Boeing’s tenacity with the Starliner, it’s been a real challenge for them to get their spacecraft safe for our astronauts, and I think they’re ready to go. We’re very happy with all of this. But the interesting thing is, even though they have overcome some very difficult technical challenges, what is the future of this program? I’m not quite sure how well it will hold up over time and what kind of investment to make. This touches on a broader issue in the industry about what the role of the traditional prime contractor or you know strategic aerospace company is in the context of LTV on the two machines you just mentioned. This team is led by a smaller company, with Boeing and Northrop Grumman, Michelin and our subcontractor BL. So I think about NASA’s environment and non-traditional procurement methods for purchasing products and services. The Artemis program has fundamentally changed the landscape and caused disruptions in strategic aviation. It’s especially important not to pick bones when you say you’re unsure about the program. But is it about the structure of a company, is this reality what you need today? Being a little more agile to move aggressively against SpaceX and other startups. I think a lot of this has to do with the future of the CIS moon economy or the Artemis campaign or a bunch of programs you should be able to do. Working in a fixed price contract environment. You have to be able to stand there and take that risk. And the government wants us as commercial companies to share the risk. And sometimes with larger strategic aviation companies. Boards and shareholders are unhappy with the risk posture, where a smaller, more nimble and nimble company can overcome these financial risks and succeed. And I think the companies that can solve this, that can deal with non-traditional acquisitions, will be the Tier One aviation companies of the future. And I think these are intuitive machines. And you also said that in some ways the structure is reversed, right intuitive machines, at least with LTV, machines that bring traditional aerospace That’s right, initially the systems integrator will be a large strategic aerospace company. Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon are in the north in this case due to their own nuances of procurement. That’s how intuitive machines bring the most value to the system integrator. And, as I talked to you before, it’s not just the ability to deliver an LTV in a cargo-grade landing design, build an LTV and then operate it on the surface. Both commercially and for NASA. This requires communication. services and tuna machinery brings all this as a one-of-a-kind company. It’s been a very eventful few months for you. It was the first commercial company to launch your spacecraft and land on the surface of the moon. not quite right and so you were able to complete the mission to the end, which I understand you did. Although NASA has been able to demonstrate all of its experiments, what is the lesson learned from them? He talks about the challenges of successfully executing a full mission while on the move. I’ll tell you something. It was an amazing achievement. We are very proud of that achievement, and I declared the success because we flew the mission well. We designed and developed a lunar mission for the price. That was about $118 million, and we did it in about four years. We have completely disrupted the industry in terms of the economics of flying to the moon. This is a success. Look at how we worked through the mission, through all the trials and tribulations as we went to the moon 300,000 miles away, and we solved every problem on the way there. We landed without a laser altimeter. We talked about it and still had a soft landing. Now we are overthrown. But we gave NASA back all the data they requested. And we traveled about 164 hours on the surface of the moon, and we needed 144 hours. What are we doing now, it attracts people’s attention I don’t know that aerospace is difficult. Flying missions in space is difficult. So naturally we have a process that we call hot wash, in this process it took 30 days to analyze every aspect of the mission. What went perfectly, what didn’t exactly what went wrong gone? Is there anything that needs to be fixed? And we came up with a series of things that said: OK, now we’re going to improve our technology, all the technology will be doing autonomous engine firings to navigate and land around the moon without GPS and with precision and avoiding hazards. No slopes greater than 10 degrees and no rocks larger than a bowling ball. So if I can do all of this on our second mission, we can improve our ability to go down to 20 degrees. Times are passing delicately, and the South Pole will need it. And that’s what we’re constantly improving for that pinpoint accuracy. So, you’re going from the Lunar Lander to now a lander for simple missions to the moon. What does profitability look like for this? So what is the commercial demand you see there? Yes, it is slightly different from what you stated. We are moving from a small science and exploration-based autonomous lander to communicating on and around the moon. Data relay satellites, navigation. They call it location navigation and scheduling to the heavier, heavier cargo and heavier cargo element. The Nova D-Class Lander will deliver our lunar lander, the first piece of infrastructure for the Artemis mission, which will carry astronauts around Earth. surface in cases of hyperactivity. Therefore, our vision as a company is to enable surface operations by providing space systems to the surface that will provide command, control and navigation in and around the Moon, together with our Lander family. These parts together I believe two of the machines are the only company that has all three parts or at least two of the three parts; The final chess piece is the near-space network contract with NASA to provide commercial communications around the moon. and we return to Earth. Therefore, we look forward to the hearing on the award in late May or early June, and this will ensure that all three parts have absolute confidence in us. We can perform such tasks and ensure this. We provide the infrastructure as a service to NASA, and they can develop the astronauts and the astronaut systems, and we will provide the power, the data, the communications, the navigation, and we’re happy to do that with the whole stack there. It’s been absolutely exciting keep track of the progress.Steve Al has intuitive machines.Nice talking to you I appreciate it.Thank you very much.