One small pivot for Musk, one giant leap back to the Moon.

[MUSIC PLAYING] Today is February 10, 2026. I'm Maria Varmazis, and this is T-minus. [MUSIC PLAYING] T-minus. 22nd to LOS, T-dred. Open aboard. [INAUDIBLE] [MUSIC PLAYING] [INAUDIBLE] Five. NASA and SpaceX are now targeting no earlier than Friday, February 13 for the launch of the Crew 12 mission to the International Space Station. Four. Star Labs Space has announced a partnership with OXILIUM Biotechnologies. Three. Voyager Technologies has been awarded a new contract to provide full service mission management services to the International Space Station. Two. SpaceX has acquired a cylinder storage business called Hexagon Masterworks for $15 million. One. Elon Musk pivots SpaceX's focus from Mars to the moon. [MUSIC PLAYING] [INAUDIBLE] [MUSIC PLAYING] Our guest today is Felipe Machado, commercial sales director at OPW Clean Energy Solutions CPC Cryolab. And I caught up with Felipe during commercial space week to discuss how they are supporting the space industry's fueling needs. More on that after today's intelligence briefing. [MUSIC PLAYING] Happy Tuesday, everybody. Thank you so much for joining me. Let's dive into the latest space news now, shall we? So one minute we are all dreaming of Mars. You, me, maybe someone else. And then the next the dream is ripped out from under us to refocus on the moon. OK, well, maybe not that dramatic, but it does seem that everyone's pausing the ambition to colonize the red planet and are once again focusing on our natural satellite. And when I say everyone, I really do mean SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. Last year the moon was, in his opinion, a distraction and this year it's back in style. Musk decided to reinforce the move on social media over the weekend where he posted this. For those unaware, SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the moon as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20 plus years. OK, so now we know he's getting real. And he went on to add, "The mission of SpaceX remains the same. Extend consciousness and life as we know it to the stars. It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months, 6 month trip time, whereas we can launch the moon every 10 days, 2 day trip time. This means we can iterate much faster to complete a moon city than a Mars city. Please do not tell me that Elon Musk has only just now been made aware of the basics of Mars orbital mechanics. In any case, so what if Musk's dream to colonize Mars, well, he says it's not entirely dropped. He did reiterate that SpaceX will also strive to build a Mars city and begin to do so in about 5 to 7 years, but the overriding priority is securing the future of civilization and the moon is faster. Elon, we've been telling you this. And so we are pleased to see that the lunar ambition is back to being everyone's priority. And speaking of SpaceX, they have acquired a cylinder storage business. The rocket company has purchased Hexagon Masterworks, which is a subsidiary of Norwegian company, Hexagon PURUS, which supplies high pressure composite storage cylinders for aerospace and space launch applications in North America, and for hydrogen mobility applications for all $15 million. Hexagon says that its hydrogen business is not part of the transaction perimeter, and Masterworks's existing hydrogen customer contracts are intended to be transferred to other parts of Hexagon prior to closing. Voyager Technologies has been awarded a new IDIQ contract for NASA's Johnson Space Center. The contract has a ceiling of $24.5 million for a four-year period to provide full-service mission management services to the International Space Station. Voyager will deliver end-to-end mission services spanning payload integration, mission operations, safety and compliance, and post-mission closeout. NASA may add options that extend the scope and value of the agreement over its life, providing Voyager with a multi-year framework for recurring mission execution. And the Voyager-led Star Lab Space has announced a partnership with Auxilium Biotechnologies. Auxilium will provide orbital 3D bioprinting and biofabrication capabilities aboard the Star Lab Space Station to support the advanced research, device development, and manufacturing workflows in regenerative medicine, implantable medical technologies, and complex tissue engineering applications. Star Lab says the agreement underscores their commitment to growing scientific discovery beyond the limits of Earth. And last up, NASA and SpaceX are now targeting no earlier than 5.15 a.m. local time this Friday, February 13th, for the launch of the Crew-12 mission to the International Space Station from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Mission teams completed a weather review Tuesday morning and have waved off the Thursday, February 12th launch opportunity due to forecast weather conditions along Crew-12's flight path. Let us hope Friday the 13th is a lucky one for them. And that is it for today's Intelligence Briefing, my friends. As always, you can find out more about all of the stories in today's headlines by following the links in our show notes or on our website, space.n2k.com. Today's guest is Felipe Machado, commercial sales director at OPW Clean Energy Solutions, CPC CryoLab. We had our chat at Commercial Space Week in Orlando, Florida just a few weeks ago. So my name is Felipe. Today I lead sales, marketing, and product for the OPW Clean Energy Solutions, which is part of the Dover Corporation. And we are here because we play an exciting role on the aerospace, especially on the infrastructure build. So this is what led us to come here today. That's awesome. So tell me a bit about the company. Let's get into a little bit of detail, the kind of work you all do. Yeah, so Dover Corporation is a Fortune 500 company. We play in many different industrial segments. And aerospace is becoming one of them, because as you know, aerospace is now going from that phase of no longer an experimental type of industry, it's becoming more industrial. So a lot of companies are jumping to the space. And a few years ago, Dover put together a cryogenic platform. So it acquired five different companies all over the world. And with that expertise and capabilities put together, now we are serving a lot of the space companies with ground support infrastructure. So essentially all the transfer lines that goes from the storage tank to the rocket. And we act more on the cryogenic side. So bringing all that cold fuel like liquid oxygen, liquid hydrogen, liquid methane, we make sure everything is kept very cold. So they don't have any issues on the launch operation. Yeah, so I imagine you all have been very busy lately. I imagine you also have a large presence probably down here at Kennedy. Where else are you all working out of? Yeah, so we have plants in different places of the US. So we have one in Minnesota, we have one in Georgia, one in Pennsylvania and one in North Carolina. We also support the vaporizers from the California side. But we play globally, as I said, so we have a plant in China, Germany and a couple in the Netherlands. Interesting. So tell me a bit about what you all have been doing specifically with space programs. So anything with Artemis potentially? Yes. We actually did supply some cryogenic valves for preparing for the launch. So we are very excited about that. In fact, our annual strategy kickoff and sales meeting will be in Orlando. So potentially we could see as a group everything that we collaborated with that process. So yeah, it's a critical role because we do a lot of the behind the scenes that nobody sees. So it's very exciting to see the rocket going up. We work a few steps before that. So essentially, like I said, the fuel that goes into the rocket, we have to make sure there's no heat leak or everything is very stable for the launch. And more recently, like I said, we are modernizing the infrastructure, which means we are also working with the space companies to reduce the launch window of the rockets. So getting more infrastructure in place actually helps them to accelerate the whole process. What does it mean to modernize that part of infrastructure? Yeah, so a lot of the launch pads today in the US, they have been sitting for more than 50 years. Yeah. So as the logistics is hitting up, literally, we see the need to help them with all the cryogenic solutions, making sure we are responding to their specs and whatever requirements they have now. Like I said, have bigger bore sizes for the pipes to bring the fuel from the storage place to the rocket. Different fuel types also, I would imagine. Yeah, the new ones, yeah. Yes, there is that complexity too because some companies, they use liquid oxygen and liquid methane, but others are using liquid hydrogen and sometimes it's a mix of everything. Yeah, so we work very closely with the companies to understand their specs and requirements, so we give them the proper hardware in place. Yeah, yeah. So what do you think people should know about not just the work that you all do, but maybe in terms of where this kind of key infrastructure fits in with the space ecosystem, especially I'm thinking about a lot of the businesses that are here, and that would be potentially working with you all or that you all might be supplying. What would you like them to know? Yeah, I think it's important to show, like I said, before we are leaving this era of moving from experimental to scale. Yeah. So when we look back in the airports from the 40s and 50s, you only had a few takeoffs and landings, and now we are talking about hundreds of launches per year. Yeah. So that difference in scale is bringing a lot of expertise and industrial players to play a key role in the industry. And I think the cryogenic side is very interesting because it's the way you manage energy on the ground side, but also in space. So it becomes an extremely mission-critical type of topic to address. Yeah. And I think we are starting to supply more and becoming more influential in this area, but at the same time, we see other players that are, I'd say, expanding the ecosystem, which is what we need today. Yes, yeah. So I'm thinking about, I imagine in a business like yours, planning for the future must, of course, very critical, but also must be extraordinarily challenging given what you are physically working with. And that there are all these new players that are always coming into the market, especially from the commercial side with very different specifications and requirements. What is that like for you while managing that? Yeah, no, that's an excellent question. I think one of the benefits we have with our company today is we're playing in different segments that are also mission-critical, and they deal with cryogenics like data centers, nuclear fusion, any name it. So every time there is a molecule in the cryogenic state, we are probably there working to move it from one place to another. So I think this exchange of experiences in different segments also helps us to bring more knowledge and more experience, so we don't start from zero. And also the fact that we work very closely with the gas majors, which also produce the molecules. Yes, yeah. That visibility of the entire chain also plays a key role for us to be one of the pioneers and leading companies in this segment. Yeah, I was going to ask about other industries that were all working. You mentioned nuclear, and that is also an area, especially with spaceports, there's a lot of crossover there in these areas, that must be really interesting as well. It is. So there are some solutions that we can carry from one segment to another and kind of leverage that experience. But segments like nuclear fusion, they are so unique and it's specific to make everything stable. But yes, we see a little bit of that crossover. There are plans and missions there trying to build these nuclear reactors on the moon. Today seems a bit of a pie in the sky idea, but I'm sure decades from now is going to be the norm. Yeah, it's amazing. We didn't think all that long ago that a couple of thousand satellites was even possible, and now we're at over 10,000 easily and we're looking at hundreds of thousands. Yeah, it's amazing how fast things have changed. So I'm wondering for you from your point of view, what are you most excited about in terms of what you see specifically within the space industry? You know, I think one of the most exciting things for me today is to see the conversion point of all the different missions from the military side, civil and commercial all coming together to try to really firm up the building blocks and go to the scale that I mentioned. I think this is the part that is going to become more natural when we see aerospace is no longer like, okay, the science fiction type of industry is more like, it's part of our day to day. When you look at the window, if you're here in Florida, you see a launch every other day. It's like whatever. People just go what? Yeah, it's amazing. So I think that that part is amazing. Something that becomes natural. I was in one of the panels today and watching the panel and one of the person said, he's trying to build this capability and making these conversations about having astronauts in the moon, like visiting not just flying by but visiting the moon, something more natural for our grandchildren. So I think that part is very exciting. When you make that a normal conversation, something more natural than just, here's another mission. So that part I think is amazing. We are here to support the industry. If there is any needs or requirements, things that we can help on the cryogenic side, we will be more than happy to support the companies that are already in place, but also the ones that are coming to this segment now. We're very glad to support everyone. We'll be right back. Welcome back. The International Space Station is Earth's orbiting lab and I've said it a bunch. It is, in my opinion, one of the greatest achievements in human history. No fooling. And it makes a lot of sense to me that as an orbiting lab, the ISS is not only helping us figure out hard problems on Earth, but it is also where we beta test some important work around spaceflight for the moon and hopefully one day beyond. We've been collecting astronaut crew data for years now on how they respond physiologically and psychologically to the stresses of low Earth orbit while they're on the ISS. So we will be adding some moon orbital data points to that set pretty soon, thanks to the Artemis II mission. And that's kind of exciting. I do wonder what we will find out. And all of those headlines about growing organs or cell clusters in low Earth orbit on those ISS experiments. Yeah, Artemis II will be taking some tiny versions of those experiments with them as well, with tiny cells and also tiny-fied versions of the instrumentation, because again, it stands to reason. If cell growth or cell response do interesting things in low Earth orbit, what might it all do in moon orbit, huh? Well, there's only one way to find out after all. Let's do some science, people. [Music] And that's T-minus, brought to you by NTK Cyberwire. We'd love to know what you think of our podcast. Your feedback ensures we deliver the insights that keep you a step ahead in the rapidly changing space industry. If you like our show, please share a rating and review in your podcast app. Please also fill out the survey in the show notes or send an email to space@ntuk.com. We are proud that NTK Cyberwire is part of the daily routine of the most influential leaders and operators in the public and private sector. From the Fortune 500 to many of the world's preeminent intelligence and law enforcement agencies. NTK helps space and cybersecurity professionals grow, learn, and stay informed. As the next is for discovery and connection, we bring you the people, the technology, and the ideas shaping the future of secure innovation. Learn how at N2K.com. N2K Senior Producer is Alice Carruth. Our producer is Liz Stokes. We are mixed by Elliott Peltzman and Tre Hester with original music by Elliott Peltzman. Our executive producer is Jennifer Eiben. Peter Kilpe is our publisher. And I am your host, Maria Varmazis. Thank you for listening. We'll see you tomorrow. T-minus T-minus T-minus T-minus [BLANK_AUDIO]