John P. Thornton | |
|---|---|
 Thornton in 2022 | |
| Born | June 15, 1984 Califon, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Alma mater | Carnegie Mellon University (BS, MS) |
| Occupation |
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| Title | CEO of Astrobotic Technology Inc. (2013-) |
John Patrick Thornton (born June 15, 1984) is an American business executive. He is CEO of Astrobotic Technology Inc. which develops technology for lunar and planetary exploration. [1]
Following graduation from Carnegie Mellon University, John was recruited to Astrobotic Technology Inc. by founder Red Whittaker and was promoted to CEO soon after. Under John's tenure Astrobotic Technology Inc secured several contracts from NASA including a $79.5 million contract to deliver payloads to the moon. [2] [3] [4] [5]
In 2019, he was named CEO of the Year by the Pittsburgh Tech Council. [6] [7]
John grew up in Califon, New Jersey where he was a boy scout earning the rank of Eagle Scout and attended Voorhees High School where he was on the varsity fencing squad. [8] In 2015, John married Justine Kasznica Thornton. They live in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. [9]
Masten Space Systems was an aerospace manufacturer startup company in Mojave, California that was developing a line of vertical takeoff, vertical landing (VTVL) rockets, initially for uncrewed research sub-orbital spaceflights and eventually intended to support robotic orbital spaceflight launches.
The Google Lunar X Prize (GLXP) was a 2007–2018 inducement prize space competition organized by the X Prize Foundation, and sponsored by Google. The challenge called for privately funded teams to be the first to land a lunar rover on the Moon, travel 500 meters, and transmit back to Earth high-definition video and images.
Astrobotic Technology inc., commonly referred to as Astrobotic is an American private company that is developing space robotics technology for lunar and planetary missions. It was founded in 2007 by Carnegie Mellon professor Red Whittaker and his associates with the goal of winning the Google Lunar X Prize. The company is based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Their first launch occurred on January 8, 2024, as part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program. The launch carried the company's Peregrine lunar lander on board the first flight of the Vulcan Centaur rocket from Florida's Space Force Station LC-41. The mission was unable to reach the Moon for a soft or hard landing. On June 11, 2020, Astrobotic received a second contract for the CLPS program. NASA will pay Astrobotic US$199.5 million to take the VIPER rover to the Moon, targeting a landing in November 2024.
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Moon Express is an American privately held early-stage company formed in 2010 by a group of Silicon Valley and space entrepreneurs. It had the goal of winning the $30 million Google Lunar X Prize, and of ultimately mining the Moon for natural resources of economic value. The company was not able to make a launch attempt to reach the Moon by March 31, 2018, the deadline for the prize.
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Blue Moon is a family of lunar landers and their associated infrastructure, intended to carry humans and cargo to the Moon, currently under development by a consortium led by Blue Origin and including Lockheed Martin, Draper, Boeing, Astrobotic, and Honeybee Robotics. Two versions of Blue Moon are under development: a robotic lander planned to land on the Moon in 2024, and a larger human lander planned to land a crew of four astronauts on the lunar surface for the NASA Artemis V mission in 2029.
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ispace Inc. is a public Japanese company developing robotic spacecraft and other technology to compete for both transportation and exploration mission contracts from space agencies and other private industries. ispace's mission is to enable its clients to discover, map, and use natural lunar resources.
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Deep Space Systems, Inc (DSS) is a private aerospace company dedicated to systems engineering that supports the design, development, integration, testing and operations of science and exploration spacecraft.
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Peregrine Lunar Lander flight 01, commonly referred to as Peregrine Mission One, was an unsuccessful American lunar lander mission. The lander, dubbed Peregrine, was built by Astrobotic Technology and carried payloads for NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program. Peregrine Mission One launched on 8 January 2024, at 2:18 am EST, on the maiden flight of the Vulcan Centaur rocket, by United Launch Alliance (ULA). The goal was to land the first U.S.-built lunar lander on the Moon since the crewed Lunar Module from the Apollo program in 1972.
VIPER is a lunar rover developed by NASA, and currently planned to be delivered to the surface of the Moon in November 2024. The rover will be tasked with prospecting for lunar resources in permanently shadowed areas in the lunar south pole region, especially by mapping the distribution and concentration of water ice. The mission builds on a previous NASA rover concept called Resource Prospector, which was cancelled in 2018.
DHL MoonBox was a mementos box that was launched to the Moon in 2024 on Astrobotic Technology's Peregrine Lunar Lander. The DHL MoonBox was made by DHL. It contained 28 capsules all of which have been filled. It contained items from the USA, UK, Canada, Nepal, Germany and Belgium.
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