All Space All the Time
Updated on July 15 to clarify layoffs and furloughs. Updated on July 15 with a statement from NASA.
by Douglas Messier Managing Editor
MOJAVE, Calif. — Cash-strapped Masten Space Systems has furloughed all of its staff, putting at risk both the company and a $75.9 million NASA-funded mission to deliver the MoonRanger rover and eight scientific payloads to the lunar surface aboard Masten’s XL-1 lander late next year.
“XL-1 is basically dead. To my knowledge, everyone who was working exclusively on XL1 has been laid off,” a source familiar with the situation told Parabolic Arc in a written response to questions. The source requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the matter.
The source was referring to a June 24 meeting in which 20 employees were laid off, including 15 engineers working on the XL-1 mission. Masten subsequently furloughed the rest of its staff for the month of July. A furlough means employees could be brought back to work at a later time.
The furloughs came after Masten spent the last several months shedding key employees. Reuben Garcia left in March after nearly 12 years with the company. His most recent roles were as director of technical operations/manager of landing systems.
Long-time CEO Sean Mahoney, who joined Masten as director of strategy in December 2010, announced his departure in April. The company began losing employees in the months that followed, the source said.
Another source at the Mojave Air and Space Port in California said the Masten Space parking lot has been empty all week. The source saw a delivery person fruitlessly trying to find someone to sign for a package at the company’s building.
Founder David Masten did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
NASA awarded a contract for Masten Mission 1 in April 2020 as part of the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative. Under the program, the space agency pays companies to deliver payloads to the moon instead of building the vehicles itself.
“The $75.9 million award includes end-to-end services for delivery of the instruments, including payload integration, launch from Earth, landing on the Moon’s surface, and operation for at least 12 days,” NASA said in a press release.
CLPS is part of NASA’s Artemis program to return astronauts to the lunar surface later in this decade. The precursor missions are decided to find evidence of water and characterize the lunar environment before astronauts arrive.
A NASA spokesperson responded with a statement on Friday evening.
In 2020, NASA selected Masten Space Systems of Mojave, California to deliver and operate eight payloads – with nine science and technology instruments – to the Moon’s South Pole in 2023. Through the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative, NASA is purchasing the delivery service from CLPS providers to deliver NASA payloads to the lunar surface. NASA, which is one of several customers with payloads scheduled to fly aboard Masten Mission One, has been notified that there are some changes taking place with Masten and that NASA’s payload delivery will be impacted. The agency is working closely with Masten and awaiting additional details on these changes. In the event Masten Space Systems is unable to deliver the agency’s eight payloads to the Moon, NASA will look to schedule delivery of these payloads on other CLPS flights. For additional information, please contact Masten Space Systems directly.
Masten is one of four companies awarded contracts for CLPS lunar landers. The other companies include: Astrobotic Technology of Pittsburgh, Pa.; Firefly Aerospace of Cedar Park, Texas; and Intuitive Machines of Houston, Texas.
The XL-1 lander was originally scheduled to launch in December 2022 bound for a landing at the moon’s south pole. In June 2021, Masten announced an 11-month launch delay to November 2023. The company said the delay was caused by industry-wide supply chain disruptions and the effects of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
CLPS partners are expected to supplement NASA mission funding by carrying payloads for other parties. The source who requested anonymity said that is where Masten’s mission ran into problems.
“We ran out of money after grossly underbidding. The estimate was $105 million but I was told that we had found a 30 million dollar private customer who wanted to fly with us,” the source said.
However, that customer later pulled out the venture. Subsequent attempts to fill the gap failed, the source added.
“When the board ‘phased out’ Sean Mahoney sometime in April or May, the long-time angel investor Joel Scotkin took over as temporary CEO,” the anonymous source said. “He tried to reassure the team by saying that Masten had a two month runway and that would be plenty of time to find investors. However, that’s when we started leaking employees, maybe at a rate of two to three per week….
“Joel Scotkin tried to raise money, and we had several letters of intent, but the deals all fell through,” the source added. “Our greatest failure overall is most likely that we never had a chief engineer on the project, and our systems engineering team had never worked on spacecraft (they had lots of experience in construction work if I’m not mistaken).”
Parabolic Arc has reached out to Scotkin for comment. The story will be updated with any response received.
Masten has built and operated a family of reusable, low-altitude rockets that have been used to fly experiments and test technologies for use in landing vehicles on other worlds. Masten Mission 1 was the company’s first contract to build a spacecraft.
Masten was sued earlier this year by Agile Space over an alleged payment of $2.51 million that was owned for the production of spacecraft thrusters. A Masten spokeswoman said the suit had been settled.
“Masten and Agile have reached an amicable resolution that is satisfactory to both parties. To clarify, this matter is not related to Masten Mission 1, which is scheduled to launch in late 2023,” the spokesperson said.
NASA selected the following payloads to fly on Masten’s XL-1 lander.
If you had the money, which suborbital spacecraft would you fly on?