NASA sold its Apollo services to a single market -- the nation's taxpayers. It satisfied their desire to catch up to the Soviet Union in space spectaculars. The price was $118 billion, in 1993 dollars.
The taxpayers' desire to beat the USSR is gone, along with the Soviet Union itself. The only other nation with a Moon program, Japan, has launched just one probe and thus will not spur a new Moon race.
With single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) rockets and External Tank space habitats, LunaCorp's cost of space exploration will be reduced to perhaps 2% to 4% of a NASA-style program. This means LunaCorp is seeking markets that together could pay $2.4 billion to $4.7 billion. These markets include:
Corporate sponsors
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Companies provide several billion dollars a year to support sports events, music festivals and the like.
Broadcasters
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Broadcast and cable programmers have purchased TV packages priced at over a billion dollars each from professional sports leagues.
Non-profit entities
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Governments, universities and foundations will pay for contract research on lunar science issues and for contract operation of lunar installations such as far-side observatories.
Corporations
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Companies will pay for contract R&D to test equipment and industrial processes on the Moon.
Other outposts
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In later stages, LunaCorp will sell basic products and services (electricity, food, fuel) to other companies or governments operating on the Moon.
