Intuitive Machines said it is on track for a second mission to the Moon in the final quarter of 2024.
In February, Intuitive became the first private company to land on the Moon when its unmanned probe touched down on the lunar surface having been carried by a SpaceX rocket.
“On our second mission, which will be in the last quarter of the year, we are actually installing a 4G network on the surface of the moon,” founder Kam Ghaffarian said in an interview on Thursday at the Bloomberg Technology Summit in San Francisco.
Intuitive Machines went public in 2023 via a reverse merger with a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, making Ghaffarian a multi-billionaire.
Another company he co-founded, Axiom, plans to launch its first space station module in 2026 having recently raised US$350 million.
Axiom’s module will attach to the International Space Station.
“The space economy is on the verge of really growing in a very accelerated manner,” Ghaffarian said, adding that “AI, quantum computing and robotics actually are force multipliers".
Shares today dropped 2% to US$5.97.