Intuitive Machines (NASDAQ: LUNR) stock soared 15.8% through 9:45 a.m. ET Friday morning after the company announced it has won its fourth moon landing contract from NASA.

IM-4 -- the name of the mission -- will see Intuitive Machines send another of its Nova-C-class moon landers to the lunar south pole, there to deliver "six science and technology payloads, including one European Space Agency-led drill suite."

Intuitive Machines' IM-4 mission falls under the umbrella of NASA's multibillion-dollar Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative, which hires private space companies to carry payloads to the moon as preparation for Project Artemis -- Mankind's return to the moon. Financially speaking, CLPS is structured to have contractors perform missions as a service for NASA, rather than the old system in which companies would build and sell spacecraft to NASA, which the space agency would then launch and operate.

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Source Fool.com