Rendering of the Argonaut lunar cargo vehicle. Photo: Thales Alenia Space

Thales Alenia Space has signed a large, new contract with the European Space Agency (ESA) to spearhead Europe’s plans to have better and autonomous access to the Moon. The contract, worth 862 million euros ($898 million), is for ESA’s Argonaut Mission. Planned to launch from the 2030s, Argonaut will deliver cargo, infrastructure and scientific instruments to the Moon’s surface. Thales Alenia Space announced the contract win, Jan. 30.

The contract is related to the design, the development and the delivery of the Lunar Descent Element (LDE) for ESA’s Argonaut Mission, including responsibility for mission design and integration. The first mission is envisioned to deal with delivery of dedicated navigation and telecommunication payloads as well as energy generation and storage system, as European enterprises to explore the Lunar southern area.

The Argonaut spacecraft consists of three main elements: the LDE for flying to the Moon and landing on the target, the cargo platform one, which is the interface between the lander and its payload, and finally, the element that the mission designers want to send to the Moon.

“Argonaut lunar lander means a lot to our company. Thanks to this astonishing space vehicle, tons of cargo will be delivered to the Moon’s surface, including rovers, scientific missions and many more. This new element of the Artemis program will serve at facilitating long-duration manned lunar exploration missions and will be crucial to increase European autonomy in lunar exploration,” Hervé Derrey, Thales Alenia Space CEO, said in a statement.