Firefly Aerospace a market leading space and defense technology company, announced the acquisition of Space-ng a leader in AI-powered vision navigation and autonomous guidance systems. The acquisition brings proven spacecraft software and camera hardware for Firefly’s Blue Ghost landers and Elytra orbital vehicles, bolstering Firefly’s capabilities to advance the future of autonomous space operations for missions to the Moon, Mars and beyond.

Space-ng’s vision navigation software was utilized during Firefly’s historic Blue Ghost Mission 1 to determine position and attitude, detect hazardous lunar terrain, and autonomously redirect Blue Ghost in real-time, enabling a safe, precise touchdown within the Moon’s Mare Crisium.

“Space-ng’s vision navigation technology proved itself in the most critical moments of our descent, allowing Blue Ghost to autonomously perform two hazard avoidance maneuvers and safely touch down on the Moon for the first time in commercial space history,” said Jason Kim, CEO of Firefly Aerospace. “This acquisition represents a strategic investment in both the experienced team and technologies from Space-ng that will continue to play a pivotal role in advancing autonomous space operations. We’re proud to welcome Space-ng to the Firefly team as we work towards enabling regular, repeatable access to the Moon and beyond.”

In addition to vision navigation software, Space-ng brings high-resolution spacecraft cameras and AI compute hardware to enable advanced space domain awareness, onboard optical navigation, rendezvous and proximity operations, and docking without requiring GPS or GNSS. Firefly plans to integrate Space-ng’s technologies across its fleet of lunar landers and orbital vehicles to support its growing mission manifest, including three additional lunar missions under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative, another lunar mission supporting NASA MoonFall, and a space domain awareness mission for the Defense Innovation Unit.

“Blue Ghost Mission 1 demonstrated what’s possible with Space-ng’s modern approach to simulation, perception, autonomy, and flight software,” said Ethan Rublee, co-founder and CEO of Space-ng. “This acquisition allows us to scale Space-ng’s products and apply them across Firefly’s exciting vehicle line and mission roadmap. Together, we’ll continue building an AI-first software foundation for the next era of space exploration and help execute some of the hardest missions in space.”

Headquartered in Littleton, Colorado, Space-ng was founded in 2024 as a spinoff of Farm-ng, which began in 2020 providing AI-powered vision navigation and robotic solutions for the farming industry. The Space-ng team brings deep expertise in artificial intelligence, computer vision, autonomous systems, and flight software. Along with the Space-ng team, the company’s co-founder and CEO, Ethan Rublee, is joining Firefly as the Chief Engineer of Software, and will oversee Firefly’s spacecraft software suite. As a result of this transaction, Space-ng will be fully integrated into Firefly. Firefly will continue to offer Space-ng’s vision navigation and autonomous guidance capabilities to government and commercial customers under the Firefly Aerospace brand.

Click here to know more about Firefly Aerospace's Latest  Space Missions