Moon economy: The race to build a business beyond Earth

BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. —

In our second race back to the moon, NASA isn’t just trying to plant an American flag, and it’s not going at it alone.

Commercial companies are playing a huge role in building what could become an entire economy beyond Earth.

“SpaceX gets a lot of attention because of its launch cadence, which has been far outstripping anyone else,” Jon Crocker said. “They’re not the only ones out there on the launch pad. Blue Origin is out there. You mentioned Relativity. Rocket Lab. All of these companies are making efforts to breach the frontier into space and low Earth orbit.”

Jon Crocker is a clinical professor and director of space commerce at the University of Maryland. He’s been assessing lunar investments, SpaceX’s growth and orbital computing.

The University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business offers a dedicated Space Commerce program to prepare students for careers in the growing aerospace economy. It’s one of only a few in the country.

He highlighted a recent report from Deloitte. It projects the lunar economy could reach $566 billion by 2050. Infrastructure would be the foundation of the lunar economy, but transportation is a close second, with a prediction of generating $206 billion in economic value.

Crocker said that’s just the beginning.

“It’s not just the infrastructure that’s being put up into space, but the way other companies can then leverage that same technology to deliver products here on Earth,” Crocker said.

He gave the example of our GPS systems and rideshare apps. Those services are made possible because of technology in space.

Crocker said for companies willing to bet on space, the payoff is only getting bigger.

“It seems like there is a lot of activity right now, but it is just going to keep growing exponentially over the next few years,” Crocker said.