Relativity Space, the rocket company led by former Google executive Eric Schmidt, was selected to launch NASA’s Aeolus payloads to Mars in 2028, as previously reported. techcrunch. Under a new public-private partnership, Relativity Space will provide “spacecraft, rocket and cruise operations” to fly Aeolus to Mars, where the payload will provide “the first integrated, daily, global view of Mars’ winds, temperatures, dust and clouds.”
The Aeolus payload will have four instruments to study the Martian atmosphere, which NASA says will “directly inform entry, descent and landing systems and support safer, more predictable mission planning for astronauts.”
Schmidt, who served as CEO of Google from 2001 to 2011, became CEO of Relativity Space in 2025, a few years after launching “the world’s first 3D-printed rocket,” Terran 1, which failed shortly after launch. The first launch of Relativity Space’s larger Terran R rocket is not scheduled until later this year.
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