Intuitive Machines
Intuitive Machines, Inc. is an American space exploration company headquartered in Houston, Texas. It was founded in 2013 by Stephen Altemus, Kam Ghaffarian, and Tim Crain, to provide commercial and government exploration of the Moon. Today the company offers lunar surface access for transportation and payload delivery, data transmission services, and infrastructure-as-a-service. Intuitive Machines holds three NASA contracts under the space agency's Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative, to deliver payloads to the lunar surface. Intuitive Machines is one of three companies selected by NASA to advance Lunar Terrain Vehicle capabilities.
Intuitive Machines, LLC, went public in February 2023 after merging with Inflection Point Acquisition Corp., a special-purpose acquisition company. The company is incorporated in Delaware, and trades on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol, LUNR.
Intuitive Machines' Lunar Payload Delivery Services program seeks to open commercial access to the Moon. NASA selected Intuitive Machines' LPDS program for four lunar missions. In February 2024, Intuitive Machines' Odysseus lander experienced a soft but unstable landing on the lunar surface, ultimately tipping over and receiving minimal data from payloads before entirely losing communications. Despite not meeting many mission objectives, Odysseus is the first American spacecraft to land on the surface of the Moon since the Apollo Program, and the mission is considered a partial success by most industry experts. The next Intuitive Machines' lunar mission in March 2025 suffered the same fate as its predecessor, tipping over due to problems with the lander's laser altimeter.
History
Intuitive Machines, Inc. was founded in 2013 by Stephen Altemus, Kam Ghaffarian, and Tim Crain, to provide commercial and government exploration of the Moon. It is incorporated in Delaware, and headquartered in Houston, Texas.Intuitive Machines merged with the special-purpose acquisition company Inflection Point Acquisition Corp. to become a publicly held company, a transaction that was completed on February 14, 2023, and its stock began trading on the Nasdaq that day.
On November 4, 2025, Intuitive Machines announced that it would buy Lanteris Space Systems from Advent International in a transaction worth $800 million.
Company overview
Intuitive Machines provides infrastructure as a service and is the catalyst for growing a lunar economy by using three pillars of commercialization: Transportation and delivery of payloads, including rideshare delivery and lunar surface access; collection, processing, and interpretation of space-based data, through command, control, communications, reconnaissance, and prospecting; and infrastructure on the lunar surface, including space assets to perform tasks and make decisions without human intervention. These functions may include navigation, maintenance, scientific data collection, and system health monitoring.Nova-C
In November 2018, IM was selected by NASA as one of nine companies to bid on the Commercial Lunar Payload Services program. Their lander, Nova-C, was NASA CLPS first mission of the program, focused on the exploration and use of natural resources of the Moon.On May 31, 2019, NASA announced it had awarded Intuitive Machines $77 million to build and launch their Nova-C Moon lander.
On April 13, 2020, IM, under contract to carry NASA science instruments to the Moon on a robotic spacecraft, said that its first lunar mission would target a deep, narrow valley named Vallis Schröteri. The mission objective was to place the Nova-C lander at crater Malapert A, near the south pole of the Moon.
Missions
IM-1
An Intuitive Machines contract with NASA covered transportation to and operations on the Moon, for five NASA science instruments and several commercial payloads. The company launched its first mission based on the contract, with one of its Nova-C class landers spending seven days travelling to the Moon. On February 22, 2024, Intuitive Machines' Odysseus lander experienced a hard landing on the lunar surface, ultimately tipping over and receiving minimal data from paylaods before entirely losing communications. Despite the failure to meet many mission objectives, Odysseus is considered the first American spacecraft to land on the surface of the Moon since the Apollo Program. The lander survived for six days total.The Odysseus lander fell on its side when landing, but its instruments remained partially functional, so the mission was judged a success by Intuitive Machines and the sponsoring customer, NASA.
IM-2
IM-2 Athena was launched on February 27, 2025, carrying Micro-Nova Gracie and other rovers and payloads. This mission is designed to validate water hunting infrastructure, and essential mobility services like its Micro-Nova hopper; the hopper is designed to deploy off the lander and prospect by hopping across the lunar surface. IM-2 Athena has completed its propulsion system's hot fire test, the most complex integrated test of the lander thus far.The Athena lander achieved soft landing on March 6, 2025, but landed on its side, precluding recharging and deployment of payloads. Operations concluded March 7, 2025, less than 13 hours after the hard landing. On March 13, Intuitive Machines shared that, like on the IM-1 mission, the Athena
IM-3
The third lunar delivery mission is undergoing integrated vibration testing with an anticipated mission window in early 2026. This planned mission is designed to deploy the first of five data relay satellites under a Near Space Network Services contract.IM-4
The fourth surface delivery mission intends to deliver the next two data relay satellites. NASA awarded Intuitive Machines that $116.9 million mission contract in September. Additional commercial payloads are anticipated to join that mission. This south pole mission includes six NASA payloads in addition to a European Space Agency led drill suite to search for water ice.NSNS
Intuitive Machines became the sole awardee for the Near Space Network Services contract in September 2024, which is a step toward data transmission for in-space communications and navigation. The company intends to leverage its contracted surface delivery missions to deploy a constellation of lunar data relay satellites around the Moon. This is central to their strategy of supporting commercial ventures and the Artemis campaign's goal of sustained human lunar presence, as a part of the broader aim of commercializing the Moon. The NSNS contract introduces a pay-by-the-minute service model, focused on scalable data transmission services through a SaaS-type revenue model.Joint venture with KBR
In April 2023, Space Networks Solution, a joint venture of Intuitive Machines and KBR, was awarded a five year contract worth up to $719 million to support NASA's Joint Polar Satellite System.SPAC merger
In September 2022, Intuitive Machines announced that it would merge into special-purpose acquisition company Inflection Point Acquisition Corp. and . The transaction was approved by IPAX's shareholders on February 8, 2023, and the business combination was completed six days later.The stock of the newly named Intuitive Machines, Inc., began trading on the Nasdaq exchange on February 14, 2023.