NASA’s double bet on Momentus: an orbital factory and a new engine

Two NASA contracts in three days put a small platform provider at the heart of two big ideas: in-space manufacturing and a radical engine class that could reshape propulsion.

Over forty-eight hours at the end of September, NASA quietly handed Momentus two very different missions. One is about making valuable materials in orbit. The other is about firing a rocket engine that works in a new way. Together they hint at a simple shift: NASA increasingly wants hosted, orbital testbeds it can rent on demand, rather than bespoke satellites for every experiment.

On 26 September, NASA’s Flight Opportunities program awarded Momentus $5.1m to host COSMIC—a microgravity crystallisation demo for semiconductors and other materials—on its Vigoride orbital service vehicle. On 29 September, NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center granted a $2.5m task to fly a rotating-detonation rocket engine (RDRE), developed by startup Juno Propulsion, on a Vigoride mission. Both awards were disclosed on 9 October.

Why this matters

A single bus, two frontiers. The same class of small satellite can now be a factory floor and a propulsion lab. That lowers cost and time to flight for innovators—and gives NASA a repeatable way to test ambitious ideas in orbit. Flight Opportunities only recently added “hosted orbital testing” to its toolkit; these awards show the model being used for higher-stakes tech.

A platform play. If Vigoride (or any rival orbital bus) can become the default host for flight tests, the economics look more like cloud computing: standard interfaces, scheduled capacity, known pricing, and a queue of experiments. That is a different growth path from one-off rideshare deployments.

The microgravity bet: COSMIC and the chip angle

What is COSMIC? Commercial Orbital System for Microgravity In-Space Crystallization is a payload from SpaceWorks Enterprises and Astral Materials that aims to grow higher-quality crystals in orbit—initially focused on silicon semiconductor processes—with a plan to return product to Earth. COSMIC was among the TechLeap Prize winners announced in June 2025, which come with development funding and access to a NASA-assigned flight.

Why crystals in space? In microgravity, convection and buoyancy effects drop away. Decades of research show crystals can grow larger, more uniform, and with fewer defects—attributes that matter for chips and for pharma. A 2024 meta-analysis across multiple semiconductor studies found significant quality improvements for materials grown in microgravity; NASA’s recent materials compendium points to defect reduction in thin-film and alloy work.

What’s new here? COSMIC pushes beyond station science toward repeatable, commercial flows: host the process on a third-party bus, run for months, and (via SpaceWorks’ RED return capsule) bring samples back at useful cadence. If quality or performance gains translate to yield or device reliability, this becomes less “space curiosity” and more CHIPS-adjacent manufacturing R&D.

The number to remember: $5.1m buys NASA hosted orbital time and ops for COSMIC on Vigoride. For comparison, that is a mid-single-digit-million ticket to test, iterate, and return materials—without NASA having to build and fly a bespoke spacecraft.

The engine bet: taking RDRE to orbit

What is an RDRE? A rotating-detonation rocket engine uses a continuous spinning detonation wave in an annular chamber. It is a form of pressure-gain combustion that can deliver higher specific impulse and thrust per supply pressure than conventional deflagration engines—potentially enabling smaller, lighter propulsion stages for the same job. NASA papers over the last two years outline double-digit efficiency gains in testing.

Why this demo is different. Plenty of RDRE work has happened on the ground, and even in atmospheric flight tests. But no RDRE has flown in orbit. Juno’s unit—running storable, non-toxic nitrous oxide and ethane—is slated to ride a Vigoride mission for the first on-orbit firing, giving data on ignition, stability, thermal margins, and duty cycles in the real space environment. Aviation Week reports the target is 2026.

The number to remember: $2.5m for an on-orbit propulsion experiment that, if it works, could cut propellant mass or increase delivered Δv for small craft. That is a bargain for de-risking a whole class of engines.

The quiet change inside NASA: “hosted orbital” comes of age

Flight Opportunities was built around suborbital rides. In 2025 it added hosted orbital tests—where a commercial provider integrates, launches, powers, and operates your payload. Researchers focus on payload design and data; the bus takes care of the rest. COSMIC and the RDRE are early, high-value uses of that approach. If performance data—and product samples—return on time, hosted orbital could become NASA’s default path for maturing dual-use tech.

What to watch next

1. Schedules. The RDRE flight is guided toward 2026; COSMIC’s operations window should be comparable. The key milestones: payload integration, environmental testing, in-orbit commissioning, and (for COSMIC) sample return.
2. Data, not headlines. For COSMIC, look for post-flight metrology: defect density, dislocation rates, carrier lifetimes, and device-level performance versus ground controls. For RDRE, watch Isp, chamber pressure traces, detonation stability, and thermal wear, all compared with ground test data.
3. The platform thesis. If Vigoride’s hosted model proves reliable, NASA (and others) can plug in new propulsion units, sensors, materials furnaces, or biotech payloads with less new spacecraft NRE each time. That turns experimental flight into a pipeline, not a series of one-offs.
4. Follow-on buyers. Expect national labs, DoD tech directorates, and corporates to ride the same bus once the first-wave data arrive. Momentus says these RDRE and COSMIC awards are among multiple NASA tasks it has landed in recent months—momentum that matters if the firm is to scale a platform business.

Risks and the fine print

• Reentry and regulatory. Returning materials at cadence needs proven capsules and clear approvals. SpaceWorks has years of RED capsule work; the step here is orbit-to-ocean pickup with valuable payload inside. Any delay can break the business case.
• Power/thermal budgets. Crystal growth and engine firings both stress a small bus. Thermal control, contamination, and vibration isolation will be central to credible results. (This is exactly what “hosted orbital” is meant to standardise.)
• Claim versus reality. Microgravity often improves crystal quality in principle. The question is: does that translate into economics once launch, ops, and recovery are included? Only post-flight device performance—and yields—settle that.

The bigger picture

For years, in-space manufacturing lived on glossy decks—protein crystals and exotic alloys that never scaled. Two things are different now. First, hosted orbital tests make flight data and sample return faster and cheaper than bespoke missions. Second, NASA is aiming its money at building blocks that industry can adopt: better materials on one side, better engines on the other. A single small platform carrying both is a tidy symbol of that shift.