Since the mid-2000s, when Congress authorized the agency to begin cultivating public-private partnerships, NASA’s most important role has been as a seed investor and adviser to private space companies. While Elon Musk’s Space Exploration Technologies Corp. — or SpaceX — receives the bulk of attention, the commercial space industry now comprises dozens of firms in fields ranging from small satellites to lunar exploration. The results have been spectacular: By NASA’s own estimates, the cost of SpaceX developing its workhorse Falcon 9 rocket was less than 10 percent of what it would have cost if NASA had done it.
NASA’s backing is paying dividends elsewhere, too. In coming weeks, SpaceX will launch uncrewed orbital test flights of its Crew Dragon spacecraft — a capsule designed to deliver U.S. astronauts to the International Space Station. At least two other companies are looking to launch commercial space stations. Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin LLC is planning an uncrewed moon landing by 2023 (in line with NASA’s lunar goals). Meanwhile, SpaceX is developing a larger rocket that’s scheduled to take tourists around the moon that same year. And NASA, keen to encourage more lunar exploration, just announced a partnership with nine companies developing lunar landers, with the first missions set to launch as early as this year.
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