NASA gave up a ride to the moon. The rover of this startup took it.

NASA’s other views about the wiper opened the opportunity for someone else to book that ride on the moon. Just because its cargo was canceled, it did not mean that the journey of astrobotic was closed – it is scheduled at the end of this year. And on Wednesday, a small startup called the Venchuri Astralab Ink announced that he had claimed that it was an opportunity to accelerate his own lunar rover plans.

“We are excited to achieve real wheels in dirt this year and see how all our techniques perform,” Astrolb CEO Geratha Matthews said in an interview, said in an interview. (Despite the same names, both companies are unrelated.)

Many people inside and outside NASA were surprised to cancel the wiper, as the rover, while the budget and the schedule, were completed. Before it was ready for the launch, it required only another round of the test. NASA officials said that instead, the finished rover would be separated.

In addition, he said that NASA would still pay $ 323 million to astrobotic. Thus, the cancellation of the mission will save NASA after spending a relatively paletry amount – $ 84 million – after spending about $ 800 million.

For its fee, the astrobotic will operate the mission according to the plan, but the lander spacecraft, known as griffin, will carry a non -dummy dummy weight instead of the wiper.

NASA officials said that there was a valuable practice in itself to successfully perform landing for astrobotic, and that the company was free to sell the payload space on Griffin to another customer, if it could replace dummy weight .

John Thornton, Chief Executive Officer of Astrobotic, said, “More than 60 organizations around the world knocked on our doorstep.”

Astrolb, he said, was the best match. “They can move fast,” said Mr. Thornton. “He had a payload that already matched the interface for the lander.”

The rover astraralb that will fly on this mission is also similar to a wiper of almost the same size. Mr. Matthews refused to say how much Astrolb was paying astrologers.

Astralab is developing a rover a jeep wingeral size that can autonomally run people on the surface of the cargo or moon. The company calls it flex, it is small for it Flexible logistics and exploration rover.

Flex is very large and heavy to fit on the lander of astrobotic. Astralab has already booked a location for flex on the future flight of Starships, currently Garzanuan spacecraft, installed by Elon Musk under Garzanuan spacecraft under development by SpaceX.

But before sending flakes to the moon, Astrolab wants to send a small, 1,000-pound rover named Flip to test technologies such as small-bag, motors, power systems and communication for Lunar Lunar innovation platform. A special goal is studying how to reduce problems caused by lunar dust particles, which are angular and sharp.

The small flip is the one that the astrobotic griffin will take the moon.

Mr. Mathews said that Flip will also take some commercial payloads which will be announced later.

Last year, despite the failure of astrobotic, Mr. Mathews said that he had faith in astrobotic. “From our point of view, this is actually a way to reduce the risk for our later missions,” he said. “If we did not have full confidence in astrobotic, we will not do this.”

Mr. Thornton said that last year was one of the introspection for the company. “It is like an old saying,” whatever you don’t kill, it makes you strong, “he said. “I think in this case, it was actually done.”

Despite NASA’s efforts to kill the wiper, the rover is not dead nor is it over yet. NASA received a proposal to continue the mission without additional investment from NASA and received a proposal.

Agency Hope to make a decision in this summerBut everything may soon change, indicating more interest in Mars than the moon with the new Trump administration.

Mr. Thorrton said that Estrobotic was not yet worrying about that possibility. “Surely DC has a lot of conversation,” he said. “But right now we are focusing on what NASA has contracted us to do, and that is to deliver griffins to the surface of the moon.”

Mr. Matthews said that if NASA actually gave a sharp turn to Mars, Astrolb can also pive.

He said, “We have always considered ourselves a multi-planet business,” he said, “and we will be excited to go as Mars too.”