Momentus Inc., a U.S. commercial space company offering satellite buses, technologies, transportation, and other in-space infrastructure services, has been successfully executing Phase 3 of a contract from a U.S. Department of Defense organization, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), to conduct an on-orbit demonstration of the assembly of large scale structures. The mission will launch on an upcoming SpaceX Transporter rideshare mission scheduled for launch no earlier than February 2026.
Momentus recently completed several contract milestones, including the Preliminary Design Review (PDR) phase, of the DARPA Novel Orbital and Moon Manufacturing, Materials, and Mass-efficient Design (NOM4D) program and has received about $1.2M in milestone payments since March 2025.
Momentus is under contract to provide full-service support to the DARPA NOM4D program, including arranging launch services, payload integration, and on-orbit hosting of the payload for a complex in-space assembly mission. The in-space assembly will be conducted on the Momentus Vigoride Orbital Service Vehicle (OSV). The purpose of this effort is to validate the functionality, performance, and reliability of the in-space assembly payload in the LEO space environment. Momentus was awarded the initial NOM4D contract in April 2024 and work under the current phase of the contract is scheduled to continue through June 2025.
“We’re very happy to be supporting DARPA on this cutting-edge program and pleased to be playing a key role in executing this exciting demonstration of in-space assembly,” said Momentus Chief Executive Officer John Rood. “Cost-effective assembly of structures in space has the potential to transform how we operate in space, enabling less complex and cost-effective structures like large communications antennas, hubs for orbital manufacturing of advanced materials and potentially products like semi-conductors, and other systems.”
This mission marks Momentus’ fourth Vigoride mission and first mission supporting DARPA. During the mission, Momentus will support additional Government and commercial transportation and hosted payload customers utilizing its Vigoride 7 OSV. Due to significant demand, we are actively planning our next mission, Vigoride 8. Government and commercial customers interested in utilizing the ability of the Vigoride vehicle to cost-effectively launch and deliver microsatellites up to 200 kg and cube sats, provide average power up to 1kW, and deploy or operate hosted payloads in LEO orbits are encouraged to contact the Momentus Commercial team.
