NASA said in a contract document that it picked Blue Origin's proposal for its lower price, extra lander capabilities and a plan to execute two test landing missions on the moon in 20 at the company's expense. 'Honored to be on this journey with to land astronauts on the Moon - this time to stay,' (AMZN.O) billionaire founder Bezos said on Twitter after the announcement. Couluris said that Blue Origin, not NASA, would pay for any cost overruns. The contract follows NASA's trend in recent years in which it helps fund development of private astronaut spacecraft, then pays to use the craft in missions rather than spending more to own the vehicle entirely.īlue Origin, founded in 2000, is investing 'well north' of the $3.4 billion figure to develop the spacecraft, the company's lunar lander chief John Couluris told reporters at the event. 'It means that you have reliability, you have backups.' 'I've said it before: we want more competition, we want two landers, and that's better,' NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said at an event announcing the contract at NASA's headquarters. The first two Starship missions are slated for later this decade. NASA awarded fellow billionaire Musk's SpaceX $3 billion in 2021 to build its Starship spacecraft to land astronauts on the lunar surface for the first time since the final Apollo mission in 1972. NASA's decision to go with Bezos and Blue Origin will give it a second option for sending astronauts to the moon under its Artemis program. NASA picked Blue Origin over a rival bid led by Leidos Inc-owned (LDOS.N) defense contractor Dynetics that also included Northrop Grumman Corp (NOC.N). space agency said on Friday, a breakthrough for the company two years after it lost out to Elon Musk's SpaceX in another competition.īlue Origin plans to build its 52-foot (16-meter) tall Blue Moon lander in partnership with Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N), Boeing Co (BA.N), software firm Draper and robotics firm Astrobotic. WASHINGTON, May 19 (Reuters) - A team led by Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin won a coveted $3.4 billion NASA contract to build a spacecraft to fly astronauts to and from the moon's surface, the U.S.

Jeff bezos blue origin