Now that the last space shuttle has landed back on Earth, a new generation of space entrepreneurs would like to whip up excitement about the prospect of returning to the moon.
Spurred by a $30 million purse put up by Google, 29 teams have signed up for a competition to become the first private venture to land on the moon. Most of them are unlikely to overcome the financial and technical challenges to meet the contest deadline of December 2015, but several teams think they have a good shot to win — and to take an early lead in a race to take commercial advantage of our celestial neighbor.
Their goals range from lofty to goofy.
One Silicon Valley venture, Moon Express, is positioning itself as a future FedEx for moon deliveries: If you have something to send there, they would like to bring it. The company planned a party to show off the flight capabilities of its lunar lander, a prototype it bought from NASA, and "to begin the next era of the private commercial race to the moon," as the invitation put it.
"In the near future, the Moon Express lunar lander will be mining the moon for precious resources that we need here on Earth," the invitation to Thursday's party promised. "Years from now, we will all remember we were there."
Naveen Jain, an Internet billionaire and co-founder of Moon Express, says the company will spend $70 million to $100 million to try to win the Google Lunar X Prize but could recoup its investment on its first flight. He envisions selling exclusive broadcast rights for video from the moon, as well as sponsorships like NASCAR's for companies to put their logos on the lander.
Another competitor, Astrobotic Technology, intends to sell berths on its lunar lander to space agencies and scientific institutions, which would pay $820,000 a pound to send up their experiments. The company, a spinoff from Carnegie Mellon University, is building a large craft — much bigger than Moon Express' — capable of carrying 240 pounds of payload (read: $200 million of cargo) and hopes to be ready to launch in December 2013.
"We can make a lot of money even if we do not win the prize," said David Gump, president of Astrobotic, based in Pittsburgh. "We will be making substantial profit on the first flight. Basically, we'll break even by selling a third of the payload."
NASA had wanted to send astronauts back to the moon, but its moon program was canceled last year, a victim of budget cuts and shifting priorities.
But the moon program has awarded $500,000 each to Moon Express, Astrobotic and a third competitor, Rocket City Space Pioneers, the first installments of up to $30 million that it will contribute to the X Prize efforts.
"It's probably the biggest wealth creation opportunity in modern history," said Barney Pell, a former NASA computer scientist turned entrepreneur and now a co-founder of Moon Express.
While Moon Express might initially make money by sending small payloads, the big fortune would come from bringing back platinum and other rare metals, Pell said.
"Long term, the market is massive, no doubt," he said. "This is not a question of if. It's a question of who and when. We hope it's us and soon."
