Robotic construction company ICON today announced the establishment of ICON Prime, a new business unit that will work with the Pentagon and NASA.
ICON Prime will be led by former Rep. Will Hurd (R-TX), a former CIA officer who represented Texas in the US House for six years.
“How do we help with force projection in hard places? And how do we unlock the ability to build in interplanetary exploration?” Hurd told Payload about his decision to take on the job. “It was exciting to be able to help build the infrastructure that troops need at Fort Bliss, and astronauts will need on the Moon.”
Prime objective: ICON already has a robust business working with the US military and space agency, including $360M in government contracts, such as:
- A $62.8M Army contract, awarded in December to 3D-print barracks at Fort Bliss, TX;
- A $67.9M Army contract to build infrastructure at Fort Polk, LA;
- A combined $60M from NASA, including construction of the simulated Martian habitat at JSC, and a SBIR Phase II award to develop tech for in-situ building on the Moon and Mars.
“There is an all-hands-on-deck focus on this mission. The fact that the US government has aligned with the direction…it is very clear that we’re going to the Moon,” Hurd said. “Regardless of what is going to happen politically—which no one can predict—this is the direction that we’re going.”
First movers: Lunar regolith can be incredibly abrasive, causing damage to everything from space suits to hardware. One way to contend with that dust, according to Hurd, is to prioritize building roads and launch pads on the lunar surface—a need that ICON Prime is poised to meet.
“We see our role being the go-to builders, using in-situ capabilities,” Hurd said. “We’re doing that by using a laser to melt lunar regolith and turning it into material….That’s the first step in building a Moon base.”
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