NASA on Tuesday, September 2, 2026 awarded Blue Origin a firm-fixed-price contract worth up to $700 million to build and operate the agency's Mars Telecommunications Network — a next-generation, high-bandwidth relay to be delivered to the Red Planet by December 31, 2028. The award ends a decade-plus wait for a purpose-built Mars comms upgrade and beats Rocket Lab in a two-horse competitive selection.
Blue Ring goes to Mars
The spacecraft will be a version of Blue Origin's Blue Ring multi-mission space platform, already in production in Huntsville, Alabama. "Before the first human steps on Mars, we have to build the road," said Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp on X. "MTO will enable science, carry payloads, and help lay the foundation for human exploration." Tory Bruno, president of Blue Origin's National Security Group, called MTO "the backbone of America's Mars exploration program for the next decade and beyond."
Replacing an aging relay chain
NASA's current Mars relay chain rides on the aging Mars Odyssey (launched 2001) and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (2005), supplemented by ESA's Mars Express and ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter. The Aeolus study award to Relativity Space earlier this year hinted at renewed appetite for Mars orbital infrastructure; MTO turns that into a firm program of record. The network will be managed by NASA's Space Communications and Navigation program and become operational at Mars by 2030.
Diversifying beyond SpaceX
The MTO award continues NASA's push to diversify commercial partners for critical deep-space services — following Falcon Heavy's launch of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and the wave of Blue Ring-based orbital-transfer studies awarded last year. Blue Ring's first flight test rode aboard New Glenn's second launch in late 2025, checking out communications and control systems now bound for the same architecture that will circle Mars.
Reporting based on coverage from NASA, GeekWire, Blue Origin and Space.com.