NASA has awarded Intuitive Machines a contract of up to $4.82 billion for communication and navigation services for missions in the near space region, the space exploration company said on Tuesday.

Shares of Intuitive climbed 38% to $7.46 in aftermarket trading.

As part of the contract, which has a base period of five years with an additional five-year option period, Intuitive will deploy lunar relay satellites and provide communication and navigation services to aid NASA's Artemis campaign.

Under NASA's Artemis program, the space agency aims to send commercial robot landers to the moon on science scouting missions.

NASA had paid Intuitive $118 million to build and fly Odysseus, which in February became the first U.S. spacecraft to land on the moon in half a century.

  - Reuters