Rocket Lab asks NASA to open up MSR to commercial competition

ORLANDO, Fla. — Rocket Lab is asking the incoming administration to reconsider NASA’s plans for Mars Sample Return (MSR), arguing it can offer an approach that is faster and less expensive than the agency’s alternatives.

NASA announced Jan. 7 it would spend the next year and a half studying two new architectures for MSR. One would deliver a sample retrieval lander using a version…