Lockheed Martin announced today the creation of a wholly owned subsidiary called Crescent Space Services that will focus on infrastructure for the moon, the latest sign that the aerospace and defense giant is bullish on the future of a lunar economy.<\/p>\n

The new venture will focus initially on a communications and navigation network in cislunar orbit it\u2019s calling Parsec. The Parsec network will be owned and operated by Crescent, with Lockheed designing and building the spacecraft. The first satellite is anticipated to launch in 2025, timed to arrive in cislunar orbit prior to NASA\u2019s third Artemis mission, which will land humans on the moon.<\/p>\n

Lockheed installed Joe Landon as the company\u2019s new CEO.\u00a0Landon previously served as Lockheed Martin Space\u2019s VP of advanced programs development, where he led strategy and business development for the company\u2019s commercial space projects. Prior to that, he served as CFO of asteroid mining venture Planetary Resources.<\/p>\n

Crescent was born out of a shifting demand from customers, Landon explained to TechCrunch. Over the past decade, customers \u2014 primarily NASA \u2014 started to shift from buying objects, like spacecraft, to buying capabilities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat created a new opportunity for Lockheed where we needed to adapt,\u201d he said. \u201cLockheed Martin traditionally is a technology developer and manufacturer of really great systems. But what we needed and what the market is really demanding is a service.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Crescent is starting with the Parsec network, the company intends to eventually expand into providing other infrastructure services, like power and mobility. These services will likely benefit from Lockheed\u2019s existing programs, like its autonomous moon rover in development with General Motors, and its initiatives on in-space solar systems.<\/p>\n