Moon Express

Moon Express
Company type	Private
Industry	Aerospace
Founded	2010
Headquarters	Cape Canaveral, FL 32920
Key people	Robert D. Richards, Naveen Jain, Barney Pell
Website	moonexpress.com

Moon Express (MoonEx; vehicle model prefix: MX) is an American privately held company formed in 2010 by a group of Silicon Valley and space entrepreneurs. It had the goal of winning the $30 million Google Lunar X Prize, and of ultimately mining the Moon for natural resources of economic value.^[1]^[2] The company was not able to make a launch attempt to reach the Moon by March 31, 2018, the deadline for the prize.

Since late 2018, and as of February 2020^[update], Moon Express focused on supporting NASA under its Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) contract.^[3]

^ Hennigan, W.J. (2011-08-20). "MoonEx aims to scour Moon for rare materials". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2011-04-10. MoonEx's machines are designed to look for materials that are scarce on Earth but found in everything from a Toyota Prius car battery to guidance systems on cruise missiles. ... The company is among several teams hoping to someday win the Google Lunar X Prize competition, a $30-million race to the Moon in which a privately-funded team must successfully place a robot on the Moon's surface and have it explore at least 1/3 of a mile. It also must transmit high definition video and images back to Earth before 2016. ... should be ready to land on the lunar surface by 2013.
^ Brown 2011.
^
- Moon Express [@MoonEx] (9 February 2020). "With NASA's Lunar CATALYST program and the GLXP now behind us, we are focused on competing for awards under NASA's CLPS program, which now dominates the commercial lunar landscape of opportunity for small companies" (Tweet). Retrieved 26 February 2020 – via Twitter.
- Moon Express [@MoonEx] (9 February 2020). "There is no upcoming launch with RocketLab. We contracted with RocketLab back in 2015 for a GLXP attempt. We are currently focused on efforts supporting NASA under our Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) contract" (Tweet). Retrieved 26 February 2020 – via Twitter.

[lat20110408a-1] Hennigan, W.J. (2011-08-20). "MoonEx aims to scour Moon for rare materials". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2011-04-10. MoonEx's machines are designed to look for materials that are scarce on Earth but found in everything from a Toyota Prius car battery to guidance systems on cruise missiles. ... The company is among several teams hoping to someday win the Google Lunar X Prize competition, a $30-million race to the Moon in which a privately-funded team must successfully place a robot on the Moon's surface and have it explore at least 1/3 of a mile. It also must transmit high definition video and images back to Earth before 2016. ... should be ready to land on the lunar surface by 2013.

[FOOTNOTEBrown2011-2] Brown 2011.

[MoonEx-Feb2020-3] 
Moon Express [@MoonEx] (9 February 2020). "With NASA's Lunar CATALYST program and the GLXP now behind us, we are focused on competing for awards under NASA's CLPS program, which now dominates the commercial lunar landscape of opportunity for small companies" (Tweet). Retrieved 26 February 2020 – via Twitter.
Moon Express [@MoonEx] (9 February 2020). "There is no upcoming launch with RocketLab. We contracted with RocketLab back in 2015 for a GLXP attempt. We are currently focused on efforts supporting NASA under our Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) contract" (Tweet). Retrieved 26 February 2020 – via Twitter.

[4] Moon Express [@MoonEx] (9 February 2020). "With NASA's Lunar CATALYST program and the GLXP now behind us, we are focused on competing for awards under NASA's CLPS program, which now dominates the commercial lunar landscape of opportunity for small companies" (Tweet). Retrieved 26 February 2020 – via Twitter.

[5] Moon Express [@MoonEx] (9 February 2020). "There is no upcoming launch with RocketLab. We contracted with RocketLab back in 2015 for a GLXP attempt. We are currently focused on efforts supporting NASA under our Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) contract" (Tweet). Retrieved 26 February 2020 – via Twitter.

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