Blue Origin joins other five companies awarded contract with NASA. Its Flight Opportunities Program gathered UP Aerospace, World View Enterprises, Inc., Masten Space Systems, Inc., Near Space Corporation, Inc., and Virgin Galactic, LLC. These companies got opportunities to provide access to space for suborbital payloads.
For NASA, the suborbital payloads are the most popular activity, so Blue Origin was awarded an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract under NASA’s program. According to Steve Jurczyk, associate administrator for NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate: “We are pleased to have Blue Origin join our cadre of Flight Opportunities service providers.”
The joining Blue Origin to NASA’s providers’ pool gives to the Agency additional strength to a developing new capabilities faster and, potentially, at lower cost. Program’s budget not to be exceed value of $45 million, says the NASA representative.
From now, Blue Origin will compete the flight service task orders over the course until 2019. Actually, Blue Origin has worked already for NASA in 2014 and 2015. Consequently, this contract is a continuation of those agreements. Earlier, the company provided commercial capabilities using its proven flight systems. The US government requires bringing of new vendors and the addition of new flight profiles on at least an annual basis, stated the NASA’s press release.
