Exploration Laboratories (ExLabs) is a pioneering aerospace company focused on revolutionizing space exploration and resource utilization. As a spacecraft developer, ExLabs is building modular spacecraft, such as the Space Exploration and Resource Vehicle (SERV), designed for operations in GEO+ and deep-space missions, including asteroid prospecting and capture. ExLabs partners with organizations looking to collaborate on deep-space missions and has strategic partnerships with companies like XDLINX Space Labs and Antares, and works with entities like SpaceWERX. Their activities include developing technologies for object capture and control, active debris removal, and in-situ resource utilization, with a long-term goal of unlocking space-based resources for human sustainability.
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Exploration Laboratories received a $1,900,000 Tactical Funding Increase (TACFI) from SpaceWERX to accelerate work on technology to autonomously capture space objects.
Keiko Nakamura is Exploration Labs’ science advisor and served nearly 20 years at NASA, including roles as a co-investigator on the Hayabusa2 and OSIRIS-REx asteroid missions.
Exploration Labs received a $1,700,000 SpaceWERX Small Business Innovation Research contract in 2023 for technology related to autonomous capture and acquisition of space objects.
Exploration Labs intends to deposit three cubesats into Apophis’ orbit during its planned 2028 mission.
Exploration Labs is planning a 2028 mission to rendezvous with the asteroid Apophis before its 2029 Earth flyby.
Space Exploration and Resource Vehicle (SERV) is Exploration Labs’ spacecraft designed to host payloads with a mass as high as 30 metric tons in its fully stacked configuration.