Modular Open Systems Approach (MOSA) for a Robust Commercial Lunar Ecosystem

Modular Open Systems Approaches (MOSAs) have been adopted worldwide to solve a myriad of challenges. Open systems by their nature maximize accessibility, reduce barriers to entry, and prevent vendor lock. Similarly, modularity speeds innovation, fosters design re-use, and enables incremental development & growth. Architectures developed using a MOSA synergize
the benefits of modularity and open systems to produce better products at lower developmental cost and risk, saving the consumer money while allowing greater developer profit margins.

Specific to the challenge of lunar exploration, a MOSA will ensure interoperability among diverse commercial, government, and international partners. Complex spaceflight systems can be assembled, upgraded, and serviced far more easily and with greater commercial involvement with the use of a MOSA. By allowing partners to self-limit their scope to key strengths, they can
focus on producing premier components without carrying the high risk and associated cost of auxiliary tasks they don’t specialize in.

We survey commercial and Department of Defense (DoD) lessons learned in past decades, discuss DoD robotics’ experience in Iraq and Afghanistan (first without then with MOSAs), and analyze the flourishing commercial ecosystem that has resulted from DoD MOSA adoption.
We explore the future of lunar operations to demonstrate the criticality of MOSA adoption in key areas at the right time. Two specific lunar technical fields are studied as examples: Power and In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU). Finally, recognizing that the lunar ISRU campaign will be an eminently collaborative operation requiring seamless partnering among diverse commercial, government, and international partners, a comprehensive technology development ecosystem is explored aimed at enabling ISRU in a way that systems and components are affordable for commercial partners to design, build, and sustain.