Intuitive Machines

Phase A — Understand the business

Lens 1 · Company Overview

Intuitive Machines, Inc. is a Houston-based space infrastructure and services company, founded 2013 by Stephen Altemus, Dr. Kamal Ghaffarian and Tim Crain; it went public via SPAC (Inflection Point Acquisition Corp / IPAX) in February 2023. It is structured as an Up-C / "Up-C" de-SPAC: the public company (Class A, ticker LUNR on Nasdaq) is a holding company over Intuitive Machines, LLC, whose units the founders hold directly (Class C, 3 votes/share).

The business sells three things, branded internally as Build → Connect → Operate:

• Build (lunar landers + spacecraft). NASA CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) lunar-delivery missions on the Nova-C lander (IM-1…IM-4), plus — post-Lanteris — full GEO communications satellites and national-security spacecraft (IM 300 / IM 500 / IM 1300 / Maxar-heritage buses).
• Connect (space networks). The NASA Near Space Network (NSN) awards: IM is one of two awardees for Direct-to-Earth data services and the sole awardee for the lunar data-relay constellation (NSN 2.2) — a planned 5-satellite constellation around the Moon. This is the recurring-revenue "infrastructure-as-a-service" thesis.
• Operate (mission services). OMES III (a $719M IDIQ engineering-services contract at NASA Goddard, run through a JV with KBR), the Lunar Terrain Vehicle (LTV / "Moon RACER") — IM is 1 of 3 primes — and the Gateway Power & Propulsion Element (PPE).

Contract structure / payment terms (the load-bearing detail). FY2025 revenue split by contract type: fixed-price $120.3M (57%), cost-reimbursable $80.1M (38%), time-&-materials $6.7M (3%), grant $2.9M (2%). The fixed-price contracts are the lunar missions — and they are dangerous: IM-3 and IM-4 are both loss contracts (estimated costs exceed consideration; IM-4 was ~32% complete at YE25 with accrued losses). Cost-reimbursable (OMES, NSN dev) is lower-risk but lower-margin and was just gutted by NASA's OSAM cancellation. Nearly all government contracts are terminable for convenience. With Lanteris, a new revenue type appears: product revenue from satellite builds, including "orbital receivables" — performance incentives paid over the in-orbit life of a GEO satellite (15+ years), recognized during construction (cost-to-cost).

Verdict on Lens 1: A genuine, hard-to-replicate engineering franchise with marquee NASA positions — but pre-Lanteris it was a single-customer, loss-on-fixed-price, cash-burning startup dressed as a public company. Lanteris is what gives it a P&L worth modeling.

Lens 2 · Supply Chain

Map upstream → IM → end customer, named:

Upstream / inputs.

• Launch (single-source chokepoint): SpaceX is the sole launch provider for all lunar missions (IM-1 through IM-4 on Falcon 9). This is the single most important external dependency — a SpaceX manifest slip or price hike directly hits IM's mission cadence and the loss-contract math.
• In-house build: Landers, liquid-rocket engines (the VR900 engine), GNC software, precision-landing/hazard-avoidance software, and composite structures are designed and built in-house at the Houston Spaceport.
• Supplier concentration: FY25 had no single supplier >10% of purchases (FY24 had one at 17%); as of Q1'26 one supplier was 11% of purchases and 19% of payables. Lanteris adds a satellite-component supply chain (avionics, propulsion, solar arrays) typical of a GEO prime.
• Lunar-surface / ground partners: rideshare delivery providers, lunar-surface mobility providers, payload providers, and ground-segment providers across North/South America, Europe, Asia, Australia. The pending Goonhilly Earth Station acquisition (UK + US ground stations, £37M, FCC-approval pending) is a vertical-integration move into the ground-network leg.

End customers. Overwhelmingly the U.S. Government — NASA above all (one customer = 78% of FY25 revenue; see Lens 4), plus the Space Development Agency (SDA) for tracking/transport-layer satellites, and — via Lanteris — commercial GEO comsat operators and national-security customers.

Chokepoints: (1) SpaceX as sole launcher; (2) NASA as the dominant payer; (3) the lunar data-relay thesis requires successfully launching and orbiting ≥1 satellite (and ultimately 5) before any NSN service revenue flows — pure execution risk.

Lens 3 · Competitive Advantages (moats)

What's genuinely defensible:

• Flight-proven (if imperfect) lunar capability + incumbency on multi-year NASA award vehicles. IM is the only company to have soft-landed commercial payloads near the lunar south pole twice (IM-1 Feb 2024, IM-2 Mar 2025), and it sits on a stack of long-dated NASA positions — sole NSN data-relay awardee, 1-of-3 LTV primes, Gateway PPE, OMES III. Government award incumbency + the security clearances and past-performance record are real switching/qualification barriers.
• Vertical integration: in-house landers, engines, GNC software and (now) satellite manufacturing is hard and capital-intensive to replicate.
• Lanteris = ~60 years of Maxar GEO-comsat heritage (developed-technology intangible booked at $154M, customer relationships $138M) — a real installed base and IP estate.

What undercuts the moat:

• The "moat" hasn't produced a clean operational success. Both Moon landings tipped over due to altimeter failures — same root cause twice. A landing franchise that can't reliably land is a moat with a hole in it.
• Bargaining power is weak on both sides. Upstream, IM needs SpaceX more than SpaceX needs IM. Downstream, NASA holds 78% of the legacy revenue and can terminate for convenience. That is the opposite of pricing power — and it shows up as loss contracts.
• Crowded field. CLPS rivals Firefly Aerospace (landed Blue Ghost upright in 2025 — a competitive embarrassment for IM) and Astrobotic; LTV rivals Lunar Outpost, Astrolab/Venturi; NSN rivals KSAT, SSC, Telespazio; and Lanteris competes with Airbus, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, Thales Alenia, Astranis, Rocket Lab, York, Millennium.

Verdict: The moat is positional (NASA award incumbency + vertical integration), not operational (it has not demonstrated repeatable mission success or pricing power). Firefly's clean 2025 landing is direct evidence the positional moat is contestable.

Lens 4 · Segments

Hard constraint honored: the company reports one reportable segment / one reporting unit — there is no GAAP product- or geography-segment breakout to source. So the "segmentation" must be read off the customer-concentration and contract-type disclosures.

By customer concentration (the real story):

• FY2024: one customer = 90% of revenue (NASA).
• FY2025: one customer = 78% of revenue.
• Q1 2025: one customer = 78%.
• Q1 2026: FOUR customers >10% (36%, 26%, 13%, 13%) — the single-customer dependency structurally broke the moment Lanteris consolidated. This diversification is the single best thing Lanteris did for the risk profile.

By revenue type / trend:

• Legacy IM "service revenue" is shrinking: $228.0M (FY24) → $210.1M (FY25, −8%), and Q1 service revenue fell $62.5M → $42.1M YoY (−33%). Cause: NASA cancelled the OMES III / OSAM task orders (−$71.9M) and the LTV contract phase completed (−$5.6M), partly offset by CLPS (+$25.3M) and NSN ramp (+$16.8M).
• Lanteris "product revenue" is now the bulk: $141.6M in the Jan 13–Mar 31 stub period alone, at ~$0.2M operating income (≈ breakeven). Annualized that's a ~$565M run-rate satellite-manufacturing business.

Decelerating vs accelerating: legacy IM is decelerating on its own; total revenue is accelerating purely on the acquisition. Backlog tells the forward story (Lens 5): $213.1M (YE25) → $1,055.4M (Q1'26), +$612.8M acquired + $428.9M new awards (IM-5 + a government defense contract).

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Phase B — Measure performance

Lens 5 · Earnings Result (latest print: Q1 FY2026, the first quarter consolidating Lanteris)

Revenue: $186.7M total (Product $141.6M + Service $42.1M + Grant $3.1M) vs $62.5M in Q1'25 — a ~3x jump, but ~all of it is Lanteris. vs consensus: a MISS — Street was ~$200–205M. EPS: $(0.25) Class A basic/diluted vs consensus ~$(0.06)–$(0.07) — a clear miss. Profitability: Operating loss $(39.2)M (vs $(10.1)M Q1'25); total net loss $(52.5)M. But Adjusted EBITDA turned positive for the first time: +$2.7M (vs $(6.6)M Q1'25) — the headline the bulls bought. Cash quality flag (important): operating cash flow was $(54.8)M in the quarter (vs +$19.4M in Q1'25) — heavy working-capital consumption (inventory build to $57.9M + Lanteris integration). So "first positive EBITDA" coincided with the worst operating-cash quarter in the company's recent history. Read the two together. Balance sheet: cash $231.6M (down from $582.6M at YE25 after paying $403.3M cash for Lanteris), then partly replenished by a $175M equity raise at $15.12 (Feb 2026). Working capital collapsed $494.0M → $89.8M. Total assets $1.72B, of which goodwill $379.8M + intangibles $304.1M = ~$684M (40% of assets) is intangible. Backlog: record $1,055.4M (RPO $792.3M). Guidance: management reaffirmed FY2026: revenue $900M–$1.0B + positive adjusted EBITDA. (Note: this is the combined entity; organic IM alone is ~$210M, so >75% of guided revenue is Lanteris.) Market reaction: shares actually rose ~2.4% to $36.52 on the print day (May 14) despite the double miss — the record backlog + first positive EBITDA + reaffirmed guide outweighed the miss. That tells you the market is trading LUNR on backlog and narrative, not on the quarter's GAAP numbers.

FY2025 full-year context (the base being transformed): revenue $210.1M (−8% YoY); operating loss $(87.2)M; Adjusted EBITDA $(64.2)M (worse than FY24's $(41.7)M); net loss $(106.8)M; FCF $(56.0)M; net loss attributable to Company $(83.3)M. The FY25 standalone trend was deteriorating — which is precisely why management did the Lanteris deal.

Lens 6 · Earnings Calls (sentiment trend)

No transcripts on the research-layer shelf (transcripts/ empty), so this is ``-derived and lighter than I'd like — flag for the next refresh to ingest the Q4'25 + Q1'26 calls.

• Tone shift: management has pivoted the narrative from "can we land on the Moon" (2024–early 2025, defensive after two tip-overs) to "we are now a diversified, EBITDA-positive space prime with a $1B backlog" (Q1'26). The recurring phrases are now "record revenue," "record backlog," "positive adjusted EBITDA," "Build-Connect-Operate," and "accretive".
• What they've stopped emphasizing: the standalone CLPS lunar-mission economics. With IM-3/IM-4 as acknowledged loss contracts, the call narrative leans on Lanteris and the data-relay constellation, not lander unit economics.
• Credibility watch: the Q1 miss vs consensus on both lines, while reaffirming a $900M–$1B guide that depends on a freshly-integrated acquisition, is a setup where guidance confidence will be tested every quarter of 2026.

Lens 7 · Comps

Peers: the publicly-traded "new space" complex.

Read: On EV/Sales, LUNR at ~3–4× FY26E revenue is the cheapest name in the listed space complex — RKLB ~88×, AST ~260× — because the market gives LUNR little credit for the (lower-margin, acquired, government-heavy) Lanteris revenue and is pricing the loss-making lunar core. That is the crux of the bull case (it's not priced like a hype name) and the bear case (it's cheap because it's a serial-acquirer of mediocre-margin revenue with no demonstrated path to GAAP profit). I will not invent EV/EBIT or P/E for a loss-making cohort — they are n/a.

Lens 8 · Stock-Price Catalysts (what actually moves LUNR >5%)

Pattern from a 52-week range of $7.78 → $46.75 (current ~$20.26) — this is a 4–6× annual-range, retail-momentum, headline-driven stock. The drivers:

• Mission events. Both Moon-landing attempts were binary, high-volatility events; the IM-2 tip-over (Mar 2025) and mission-end were negative catalysts.
• Contract awards / cancellations. The NSN sole-source data-relay award (2024) was a major up-catalyst; NASA's OMES/OSAM task-order cancellation (which cut FY25 revenue ~$72M) was a down-catalyst.
• M&A. The Lanteris announcement/close re-rated the equity (stock was ~$17.57 at the Lanteris close, then ~$36.52 by the May print).
• NASA-budget headlines. The Trump FY27 request (−23% topline, SLS/Orion retirement, Gateway cancellation) is a recurring macro catalyst in both directions.
• Sector beta — the dominant June-2026 driver. The SpaceX IPO triggered a synchronized selloff across LUNR, RKLB, ASTS, Planet, Virgin Galactic. LUNR fell from $36.52 (mid-May) to ~$20 (late-June) — roughly −45% in six weeks on no company-specific news. The tape says: LUNR currently trades as high-beta space-sector sentiment, not on fundamentals.

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Phase C — Judge people & books

Lens 9 · Management

• Track record. Stephen Altemus (co-founder, CEO/President) — ex-Deputy Director of NASA's Johnson Space Center and JSC Director of Engineering; a credentialed human-spaceflight engineer. Dr. Kamal "Kam" Ghaffarian (co-founder, Board Chair) is a serial space-industry founder — also founder/chair of Axiom Space, X-Energy, Quantum Space, IBX. Tim Crain (co-founder, CTO). This is a deep domain-expert founding team — but the operational scorecard is 0-for-2 on fully successful upright lunar landings (both altimeter failures), which is the single most important line on their record.
• Tenure & skin in the game. Founders since 2013; the Founders collectively control ~52% of combined voting power via Class C (3 votes/share) as of Mar 11 2026. High insider control = strong alignment and entrenchment (Lens 13).
• Capital-allocation history. This is the crux. In 12 months management has done three acquisitions — KinetX ($31.3M, deep-space nav, Oct 2025), Lanteris/ex-Maxar ($851M, Jan 2026), Goonhilly (£37M, pending) — funded by a $345M convertible, $176.6M of warrant exercises, a $175M equity raise, and ~$403M of cash. They are building an empire by acquisition while the core loses money. Whether that is visionary roll-up or empire-building-to-mask-a-broken-core is the central judgment call. ROE/ROIC are negative (shareholders' deficit, accumulated deficit $(721.5)M at YE25).
• Red flags (governance). Classic de-SPAC complexity working against minority holders: multi-class control, a Tax Receivable Agreement (founders capture 85% of certain tax benefits; acceleration on change-of-control), redeemable noncontrolling interests of ~$1.06B (founders' LLC units exchangeable 1:1 into Class A — a structural overhang), and prior earn-out/warrant remeasurements that whipsawed GAAP results.
• Founder vs professional manager: Founder-controlled, founder-led. Implication: bold, long-horizon, acquisition-hungry bets with limited ability for outside holders to impose discipline. For a moonshot that can be a feature; for a cash-burning company it is a risk.

Lens 10 · Forensic Red Flags

Forensic lens — every figure labeled.

• Revenue recognition (highest-judgment area). ~Everything is cost-to-cost percentage-of-completion on long-term contracts — inherently estimate-driven, with cumulative catch-ups. IM-3 and IM-4 are loss contracts — when estimated costs exceed consideration, a provision is booked; IM-4 accrued ~$1.4M of losses and was 32% complete at YE25. Watch for further cost-to-complete adjustments on fixed-price lunar missions — that is exactly where surprises hit.
• Orbital receivables (new, Lanteris). GEO-comsat performance incentives $217.5M non-current recognized as revenue during construction but collected over the satellite's 15-year orbital life, with a securitization facility (sold receivables stay on balance sheet as the company doesn't surrender control). This is real, but it is revenue recognized far ahead of cash and depends on the satellite working in orbit — a forensic watch item.
• Goodwill & intangibles. Post-Lanteris, ~$684M (40% of assets) is goodwill ($379.8M) + intangibles ($304.1M, incl. $154M developed-tech and $138M customer relationships on 15-yr lives). The PPA is preliminary (measurement-period adjustments possible within a year). One reporting unit means goodwill is tested on the whole, and a sustained market-cap decline (the stock is −45% off May highs) is an explicit impairment trigger the company itself lists. Impairment risk is live if the stock stays depressed.
• Cash vs earnings divergence. "Positive Adjusted EBITDA" (+$2.7M Q1'26) sat alongside operating cash of $(54.8)M and FY25 FCF of $(56.0)M. Adjusted EBITDA strips out $20.0M of acquisition/integration costs and $8.8M of SBC in Q1'26 alone — i.e., the non-GAAP "profit" excludes very real cash and dilution costs of the strategy. Do not read the EBITDA line as cash generation.
• Receivables/inventory vs revenue. Trade receivables jumped $12.2M → $105.8M and inventory $0 → $57.9M Q-o-Q — but that is the Lanteris consolidation, not organic stretch. Cleaner to judge after a full combined quarter.
• Pension. Inherited $52.0M pension/OPEB liability from Lanteris (Maxar legacy workforce) — a non-operating drag and actuarial-volatility source.
• Capital structure dilution stack. $345M 2.5% convertible due 2030, conversion price $13.11 (in the money at ~$20 — dilution/overhang); $36.8M of capped calls partially offset; Series A Preferred (10% cumulative, conversion price $3.00, holder-redeemable after 5 yrs); ~$1.06B redeemable NCI exchangeable 1:1. Fully-diluted share count is materially above the ~160M Class A.
• Auditor / controls. Auditor Grant Thornton LLP (since 2021), clean opinion, going-concern basis. Still an emerging-growth company → not yet subject to SOX 404(b) auditor attestation on internal controls — a disclosure gap to keep in mind (no material weakness disclosed in the FY25 10-K excerpt reviewed).

Regulatory findings (required sub-section):

• SEC enforcement (LR / AAER): None. No SEC Litigation Release or AAER names Intuitive Machines (2021-06-29 → 2026-06-29).
• Item 3 Legal Proceedings (company's own disclosure): (a) Starlight Strategies IV LLC / Kingstown — breach-of-contract action in Delaware Chancery (filed Nov 22, 2024) alleging a former Series A Preferred holder's predecessor received fewer conversion shares than owed; company filed counterclaims; summary-judgment motions filed Feb 2026; no accrual recorded (loss not probable/estimable). (b) Inherited with Lanteris: a U.S. DOJ Civil Division Civil Investigative Demand (issued Oct 2023) investigating allegations that Lanteris/Maxar submitted false claims by failing to meet cybersecurity requirements in federal contracts (the DOJ Civil Cyber-Fraud Initiative). Status unresolved; no settlement disclosed.
• Non-SEC web search ("Intuitive Machines" FTC/DOJ/FDA/consent decree/penalty): no additional material enforcement beyond the inherited Lanteris DOJ CID above.
• Net: No SEC findings; one ordinary-course contract suit + one inherited DOJ False-Claims (cyber) investigation — the latter is the one to track, as FCA cyber-fraud settlements against contractors have been rising.

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Phase D — Project & stress-test

Lens 11 · Forward Projection (three fiscal years: FY2026 / FY2027 / FY2028)

The honest answer for LUNR is EPS is the wrong lens for the next three years — the company is loss-making and the bet is revenue scale + path-to-EBITDA, not near-term EPS. So I model revenue + Adjusted EBITDA + cash runway, every input labeled, and give an illustrative EPS band.

Base inputs (all actuals or):

• FY26 revenue: $950M midpoint of management's $900M–$1.0B reaffirmed guide; ~$565M Lanteris run-rate + ~$210M legacy IM + IM-5/new awards ramp.
• Lanteris operating margin ~breakeven-to-low-single-digit (stub: $0.2M op income on $141.6M); legacy IM still loss-making on fixed-price missions.
• Backlog $1,055M / RPO $792M, ~60–65% recognized within 12 months.

Three-year path:

• Base. FY26 rev ~$950M, Adj. EBITDA ~+$10–30M (management guides positive). FY27 rev ~$1.05–1.15B — contingent on IM-3 launching/landing in H2'26 and ≥1 relay satellite reaching lunar orbit. FY28 rev ~$1.15–1.35B. GAAP EPS stays negative across all three years in the base case (SBC, D&A on $304M intangibles ≈ $20–40M/yr amortization, interest on the convert, integration) — call it FY26 EPS ~$(0.60)–$(0.90), narrowing toward ~$(0.30)–$(0.50) by FY28.
• Bull. IM-3 lands upright H2'26, NSN data-relay service revenue inflects in FY27, Lanteris margins expand to high-single/low-double digit as a scaled prime, SDA/national-security awards convert → FY28 rev ~$1.5B, GAAP-breakeven approached late FY28. EPS could cross ~breakeven.
• Bear. NASA FY27 budget cut bites (Gateway cancelled, CLPS de-prioritized), another mission failure, Lanteris GEO programs slip / orbital-receivable write-downs, goodwill impairment on the depressed stock → FY26 rev nearer $850M, EBITDA flat-to-negative, another dilutive raise required, EPS $(1.00)+.

No forecast.ts create logged — this is the unattended --watchlist loop (skip the Brier-create step per SKILL). When promoted to a thesis, the scoreable base call to log would be: "LUNR FY2026 revenue ≥ $900M" (p≈0.60 — guidance-anchored but a Q1 miss already happened) and "LUNR FY2026 Adjusted EBITDA > $0" (p≈0.55).

Lens 12 · Bull vs Bear

Bull case (narrative). LUNR just stopped being a binary moonshot and became the value-priced consolidator of Western space infrastructure. For ~3–4× forward sales — a fraction of RKLB (~88×) or ASTS (~260×) — you own (1) a ~$565M-run-rate satellite prime with 60 years of Maxar GEO heritage and a now-diversified customer base (no single customer >36%), (2) the sole NASA award for the lunar data-relay constellation — a potential decades-long infrastructure annuity once the satellites are up, (3) a $1.06B backlog giving 60%+ near-term revenue visibility, and (4) a founder-CEO with genuine NASA-JSC pedigree executing a Felix-Dennis-style roll-up (KinetX → Lanteris → Goonhilly) into the ground-to-Moon value chain. The first positive Adjusted EBITDA quarter (Q1'26) marks the inflection. Contrarian insight the market is missing: the SpaceX-IPO selloff has thrown LUNR out with the bathwater — it's now the only cheap name in the listed space complex, and it's the one with hard government backlog rather than pure TAM dreams. If NASA's commercial pivot (SLS/Orion retired, commercial systems favored) plays out, IM is a structural beneficiary, not a victim, of budget reform.

Bear case (2–3 permanent-impairment risks).

1. The core doesn't work and never makes money. Two tip-overs from the same altimeter failure; IM-3 and IM-4 are already loss contracts. If lunar missions can't be done at a profit and can't be done reliably, the "lunar infrastructure annuity" is a money pit, and Lanteris is just funding it.
2. Single-payer dependency on a shrinking budget. Even post-diversification, the U.S. Government dominates; the FY27 request cuts NASA ~23% and cancels the Gateway program (where IM holds the PPE contract). One Congress that doesn't reverse the cuts, and the addressable spend contracts.
3. Balance-sheet/dilution doom-loop. $(56)M FY25 FCF, $(54.8)M Q1'26 operating cash, 40% of assets in goodwill/intangibles, a convert in the money, ~$1.06B exchangeable NCI overhang, and a habit of equity raises ($175M in Feb alone). A depressed stock + goodwill impairment + another raise is a self-reinforcing negative.

Pre-mortem (it's Dec 2027, thesis broke — what happened?). IM-3 tipped over (third time) or its data-relay satellite failed to reach/operate in lunar orbit; NASA's FY27/28 budget cuts stuck and Gateway/CLPS funding shrank; Lanteris GEO programs slipped and orbital-receivable allowances were taken; the company took a goodwill impairment on the ~$684M intangible block; and a dilutive raise at a low price cratered the per-share value. The "diversified prime" turned out to be a low-margin government job-shop carrying a moonshot's cash burn.

Are multiples too high? On EV/Sales (~3–4×) no — LUNR is the cheapest space name. The skepticism isn't "it's expensive," it's "it's cheap for a reason — government-heavy, low-margin, loss-making, dilutive." The multiple is a value-trap risk, not a bubble risk.

Lens 13 · Devil's Advocate (short-seller)

Dismantling the bull case:

• "It's cheap" cuts both ways. ~3–4× sales on revenue that is mostly acquired, low-margin GEO-comsat manufacturing (a commoditizing business where Airbus, Northrop, Thales and Astranis compete hard) is not obviously cheap — it may be correctly priced for a serial acquirer with negative ROIC and a habit of issuing stock.
• Revenue concentration shifted from "one customer" to "one payer." The four >10% customers in Q1'26 are mostly different U.S. Government programs — diversification of contract, not of ultimate funding source. A NASA/DoD topline cut hits all of them.
• The moat is contestable and the proof is public. Firefly landed Blue Ghost upright in 2025; IM tipped over twice. On the metric that matters most for a landing company, a direct competitor outperformed.
• Most dangerous competitor bulls underrate: SpaceX — not as a CLPS rival but (a) as IM's sole launch provider (pricing power over IM) and (b) as the entity whose IPO is now vacuuming capital and investor attention away from every listed small-cap space name, LUNR included.
• Worst capital-allocation / incentive issues: an empire-by-acquisition spree (~$900M+ deployed in a year) financed by converts, warrant exercises and dilution, run by a board the founders control (~52% vote), with a Tax Receivable Agreement that pays the founders 85% of certain tax benefits and accelerates on change-of-control (an anti-takeover poison that also transfers value from minority holders). The inherited DOJ False-Claims (cyber) investigation is an unquantified contingency riding on the marquee acquisition.
• What must hold for today's ~$20 / ~$4B price: (1) IM-3 lands and ≥1 relay satellite works; (2) FY26 revenue hits the $900M–$1B guide despite a Q1 miss; (3) Lanteris margins expand from breakeven; (4) NASA budget cuts get reversed by Congress; (5) no goodwill impairment; (6) no further large dilution. That's a lot of "ands."
• If growth disappoints 20–30%: FY26 revenue ~$700M, EBITDA negative again, the "inflection" narrative breaks, the convert/NCI overhang dominates, and the stock re-rates toward the low end of its 52-week range ($7.78).
• Single scenario that permanently impairs the business: a third high-profile mission failure (IM-3) coincident with a sustained NASA budget cut — it would simultaneously destroy the lunar-franchise narrative and shrink the addressable government spend, forcing a down-round raise into a broken story. Plausibility: moderate — IM has a 0-for-2 landing record and NASA cuts are an active policy proposal.

Lens 14 · Management Questions (ordered by information value)

1. IM-3 and IM-4 are both loss contracts today — at what mission number do CLPS lunar deliveries turn gross-margin-positive, and what specifically changes (price, design reuse, launch cost) to get there?
2. After two altimeter-driven tip-overs, what is different on IM-3's landing system, and what is your internal probability of a fully successful upright landing?
3. Walk through the path to GAAP profitability and self-funded free cash flow — what revenue and margin level, and in which fiscal year, ends the need for external capital?
4. The lunar data-relay constellation is the recurring-revenue thesis. When does NSN service revenue (not development) actually start, what's the run-rate at full 5-satellite constellation, and what gross margin?
5. What is the status and worst-case exposure of the inherited Lanteris DOJ Civil Cyber-Fraud (False Claims) investigation, and what indemnification did you get from Advent/Maxar at close?
6. You've made three acquisitions in a year. What is your hurdle rate / ROIC target on acquisitions, and how do you reconcile a roll-up strategy with negative consolidated ROIC?
7. Lanteris carries a $52M pension and ~$684M of goodwill+intangibles on one reporting unit — at what stock price / forecast revision would you take a goodwill impairment, and how do you stress-test it?
8. Orbital receivables ($217.5M) recognize revenue years before cash — what's the historical collection/write-down experience on GEO performance incentives, and how much is securitized vs at-risk?
9. With the FY27 NASA request down 23% and Gateway proposed for cancellation (where you hold the PPE contract), what is your direct revenue exposure to programs in the cut list, and your scenario plan if Congress doesn't reverse the cuts?
10. SpaceX is your sole launch provider — what is your contracted price protection and manifest priority, and what is the contingency if a launch slips a year?
11. The Tax Receivable Agreement pays founders 85% of certain tax benefits and accelerates on change-of-control. How should minority Class A holders think about that value transfer, and is there any scenario where the TRA gets amended?
12. The $345M convert (conv. $13.11) is in the money and ~$1.06B of NCI is exchangeable 1:1. What is fully-diluted share count under reasonable conversion, and how do you manage the dilution overhang?
13. Lanteris GEO-comsat competes with Airbus, Northrop, Thales, Astranis. Where do you win, and is GEO manufacturing a growing or structurally shrinking market?
14. What is the right segment disclosure? Running Build/Connect/Operate + Lanteris as one reportable segment obscures unit economics — will you break out lunar vs satellite vs services margins?
15. What is the single metric you want investors to judge you on in 2026 — revenue, backlog, EBITDA, mission success, or cash — and what number on it would make this year a success?

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