Astrobotic wins NASA moon landing contract

Holy cow. Atrobotic gets NASA to pay for their lunar mission and they get a chance to win the Google Lunar X-Prize along the way. Very clever.

http://astrobotic.net/2010/10/15/astrob ... xpedition/

it's a lot more than just astrobiotic, and it doesn't pay for the mission. it pays up to $1mil before launch, and up to $9mil in addition after landing. so it really retires almost no risk. also, they gave it to all the other serious contenders too, except Odyssey Moon for some strange reason... weird Bob Richards isn't in on it.

i'll have to try to track down the real story. it's probably a little questionable and involves relatively secretive negotiations. anyways, it's nice for them to make a gesture of offering more money, but this isn't a sponsorship by any means- it's more of an additional prize purse.

http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release.do?id=1336094

This is great news for all six teams awarded. Our team member, Draper, was the paperwork "lead" for Next Giant Leap. We all have 21 days to complete the required system definition review (SDR)specified by our contract. Everyone who completes that work will be paid the minimum $10K. I don't expect addtional tasking orders until after the SDR's have been reviewed. I also don't expect that all of the six teams will get additional tasking (CLIN #1 is worth $500K). Keep an eye on Moon Express, Inc. too!

MikeJ