Private company

Bigelow Aerospace

Logo: bigelowaerospace.com³

American space technology company

Bigelow Aerospace was an American space design and manufacturing company which ceased operations in 2020. It was an aeronautics and outer space technology company which manufactured and developed expandable space station modules. Bigelow Aerospace was founded by Robert Bigelow in 1998, and was based in North Las Vegas, Nevada.² Its products include Genesis I, Sundancer, Genesis II and Bigelow Expandable Activity Module.¹ Wikipedia text CC BY-SA 4.0

Last updated Oct 21, 2026.

Overview

1999Founded¹

Industryaerospace industry¹
HeadquartersNorth Las Vegas¹
Websitebigelowaerospace.com
Legal formlimited liability company¹

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Bigelow Aerospace was an American space design and manufacturing company which ceased operations in 2020. It was an aeronautics and outer space technology company which manufactured and developed expandable space station modules. Bigelow Aerospace was founded by Robert Bigelow in 1998, and was based in North Las Vegas, Nevada. It was funded in large part by the profit Bigelow gained through his ownership of the hotel chain Budget Suites of America.²

The story

Founded by Robert Bigelow in 1999.¹

Bigelow originally licensed the multi-layer, expandable space module technology from NASA in 2000 after Congress canceled the International Space Station (ISS) TransHab project following delays and budget constraints in the late 1990s.

Bigelow has three Space Act agreements whereby Bigelow Aerospace is the sole commercializer of several of NASA's key expandable module technologies.

Bigelow continued to develop the technology for a decade, redesigning the module fabric layers – including adding proprietary extensions of Vectran shield fabric, "a double-strength variant of Kevlar" – and developing a family of uncrewed and crewed expandable spacecraft in a variety of sizes. Bigelow invested US$75 million in proprietary extensions to the NASA technology by mid-2006, and US$180 million into the technology by 2010.

By 2010, Robert Bigelow had invested US$180 million in the company, which by 2013 had grown to US$250 million of his personal fortune. Bigelow stated on multiple occasions that he was prepared to fund Bigelow Aerospace with up to about US$500 million through 2015 in order to achieve launch of full-scale hardware.

In early 2010, NASA came full circle to once again investigate "making inflatable space-station modules to make roomier, lighter, cheaper-to-launch spacecraft" by announcing plans in its budget proposal released 22 February 2010. NASA considered connecting a Bigelow expandable craft to the ISS for safety, life support, radiation shielding, thermal control and communications verification testing for the next three years", and in December 2012, signed a US$17.8 million contract with Bigelow to develop the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM), then projected to fly in 2015. The module was berthed to the International Space Station on 16 April 2016, and was inflated on 28 May 2016. As of June 2022 it remains at the station.

Since early on, Bigelow had been intent on "pursuing markets for a variety of users including biotech and pharmaceutical companies and university research, entertainment applications and government military and civil users". The business model includes "'leasing out' small space stations or habitats made of one or more [B330] inflatable modules to different research communities or corporations". Despite these broad plans for space commercialization, the space tourism destination and space hotel monikers were frequently used by many media outlets following the 2006/2007 launches of Genesis I and Genesis II. Robert Bigelow has been explicit that he is aiming to do business in space in a new way, with "low cost and rapid turnaround, contrary to traditional NASA ISS and Space Shuttle operations and bureaucracy".

In October 2010, Bigelow announced that it had agreements with six sovereign nations to utilize on-orbit facilities of the commercial space station: UK Astronomy Technology Centre (United Kingdom), Netherlands Space Office (Netherlands), Defence South Australia (Australia), Singapore Government Technology Development Agency (Singapore), Japan Manned Space Systems Corporation, chairman is a previous director of JAXA (Japan) and Swedish National Space Board (Sweden). In February 2011, Dubai of the United Arab Emirates became the seventh nation to have signed on.

In 2011, Bigelow employed an in-house team of model makers, coming from the film and architecture industries, to make detailed models of their space habitats and space stations. Scale models were sent to "potential customers, including governments and corporations, as a reminder of the possibilities".

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Reportedly due to delays in launch capability to transport humans to low Earth orbit, Bigelow dramatically reduced staff in late September 2011, because crew transportation would not become available until "years after the first B330 could be ready", laying off 40 of their 90 employees.

In late March 2012 Bigelow began increasing staff levels once again. By April 2013, Bigelow said that they would have B330 modules ready to go to space by the time that commercial passenger spacecraft were available to ferry their customers to the dual–BA330 Alpha space station – expected in 2017 – and that Bigelow was ready to enter into contracts with customers.

Further staff reductions occurred at the start of 2016, estimated by industry sources to be between 30 and 50 people of 150 employed at the time of the layoffs. This came after the company advertised more than 100 jobs in 2015 at both its North Las Vegas headquarters and its newly established propulsion department in Huntsville, Alabama. As part of its reduction in workforce, the company closed the Huntsville facility.

In February 2018, the company announced the formation of a new subsidiary, Bigelow Space Operations, to handle operational aspects of marketing and operating space stations in low Earth orbit.

In March 2020, the company laid off all of its employees, 88 in total.

In December 2021, Bigelow transferred ownership of BEAM to NASA's Johnson Space Center.

NASA lawsuit

Bigelow Aerospace is known for its innovative work on inflatable space habitats. Bigelow Aerospace entered into a contract with NASA. The contract was to supply an expandable habitat module for the International Space Station (ISS). This module is known as the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM). The BEAM was successfully launched and attached to the ISS in 2016. In March 2021, Bigelow Aerospace filed a lawsuit against NASA. Bigelow Aerospace claimed that NASA owed the company $1.05 million. The lawsuit alleged that NASA had not paid the full amount stipulated in the contract. The contract was related to work Bigelow Aerospace had completed. The dispute centered around NASA's refusal to pay Bigelow Aerospace for its contributions to the BEAM project. Bigelow Aerospace contended that it had met all the required milestones and deliverables under the contract. However, NASA had not fulfilled its payment obligations. The company argued that NASA's failure to pay the agreed-upon amount had caused significant financial strain. This was especially the case as the company was already facing challenges due to the COVID-19 pandemic and a broader downturn in the space industry. NASA contested Bigelow Aerospace's claims. The agency said it had already paid the company for the completed work under the contract. Bigelow Aerospace had not met the criteria for additional payments, according to NASA. NASA argued that they had fulfilled the contract terms on their side. The remaining funds were not owed to the company, NASA stated.

From Wikipedia’s article on Bigelow Aerospace, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.⁴

Leadership

Who has led Bigelow Aerospace, and when. Pick a name to see everywhere that person has worked.

FounderRobert Bigelow¹

Products and brands

BA 2100
BA 330
Bigelow Expandable Activity Module
Genesis I
Genesis II
Sundancer

Listed on Wikidata.¹

Expandable module design overview

Bigelow Aerospace anticipates that its inflatable modules will be more durable than rigid modules. This is partially due to the company's use of several layers of Vectran, a material twice as strong as Kevlar, and also because, in theory, flexible walls should be able to sustain micrometeoroid impacts better than rigid walls. In ground-based testing, micrometeoroids capable of puncturing standard ISS module materials penetrated only about halfway through the Bigelow skin. Operations director Mike Gold commented that Bigelow modules also wouldn't suffer from the same local shattering problems likely with metallic modules. This could provide as much as 24 hours to remedy punctures in comparison to the more serious results of standard ISS skin micrometeoroid damage.

Expected uses for Bigelow Aerospace's expandable modules include microgravity research and development and space manufacturing. Other potential uses include variable – gravity research – for gravity gradients above microgravity including Moon (0.16 g) and Mars (0.38 g) gravity research; space tourism – such as modules for orbital hotels; and space transportation – such as components in spaceships for Moon or Mars crewed missions.

Business plans

As of October 2015 the Bigelow Aerospace website shows several pricing schemes including US$51.25 million for 60 days on a B330 space station. That price covers everything including transport, training, and consumables. For US$25 million Bigelow Aerospace customers can lease a third of a B330 habitat, roughly 110 cubic meters, for a period of 60 days.

In 2010, Bigelow proposed conceptual designs for expandable habitats that would be substantially larger than the B330, previously its largest at 330 m3 (12,000 cu ft) habitat volume. Contingent on NASA going forward with a super heavy lifter, the proposed concept would include "expandable habitats offering 2,100 cubic meters [74,000 cubic feet] of volume – nearly twice the capacity available on the International Space Station", and another providing 3,240 m3 (114,000 cu ft).

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In 2010, Bigelow Aerospace began building a large production facility in North Las Vegas, Nevada to produce the space modules. The 181,000 ft2 (16,800 m2) facility will include three production lines for three distinct spacecraft, doubling the amount of floor space at Bigelow, and transitioning the focus from research and development, with an existing workforce of 115, to production. Bigelow expected to hire approximately 1,200 new employees to staff the plant, with production commencing in early 2012.

In 2013, during execution of the contract to build the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module for the International Space Station, Robert Bigelow indicated that his company manufactures about 50% of product content in-house, while subcontracting out the remainder.

In March 2013, Bigelow signed an agreement with NASA to act as "the central link between NASA and dozens of private companies that want to play a role in the creation of a new economy – a space economy, including proposals far more complex than mere space tourism: research, manufacturing, medicine and agriculture. The agreement calls for Bigelow to liaise between NASA and the private sector to see how the U.S. government and industry could help each other".

The first deliverable on that contract, a "report which identifies companies that want to be a part of this effort, as well as potential customers", was delivered by Bigelow to NASA in May 2013.