CisLunar Industries

CisLunar Industries, founded in 2019 and based in the United States, develops electromagnetic induction furnaces and in-space manufacturing systems for processing metals in the microgravity and vacuum environment of space. The company's core thesis is that metals — particularly iron, nickel, and titanium sourced from the Moon or asteroids — can be extracted and processed on-orbit or at lunar surface facilities, enabling large-scale space infrastructure construction without launching every kilogram of structural material from Earth.

The company's signature technology is an electromagnetic induction melting furnace designed for vacuum operation. Unlike conventional arc furnaces or resistance heaters that require contact-based heating or atmospheric pressure, induction furnaces generate eddy currents directly within conductive metals via alternating magnetic fields, allowing contactless melting in hard vacuum. This is particularly relevant for space manufacturing because molten metals in microgravity can be manipulated into shapes using electromagnetic forces rather than molds, enabling novel manufacturing approaches not possible on Earth.

CisLunar is developing the METAL framework — Material Extraction, Treatment, Assembly & Logistics — as a comprehensive approach to in-space resource utilization for DARPA's LunA-10 (Lunar Architecture) program, which funds technologies for a future sustained lunar economy. The METAL framework addresses the full supply chain from raw regolith or ore feedstock through metal extraction, purification, forming, and integration into structural components for lunar habitats, propellant depots, and launch infrastructure.

In 2024, CisLunar achieved a significant milestone by demonstrating continuous casting technology in a microgravity environment — a parabolic flight test that validated the ability to produce continuous metal stock (bars, rods, tubes) in weightlessness. Continuous casting is the standard industrial method for producing steel and aluminum stock on Earth, and replicating it in microgravity de-risks a key manufacturing step for orbital and lunar production facilities.

CisLunar competes and collaborates within a nascent in-space manufacturing ecosystem that includes Redwire Space (3D printing, thin-film manufacturing), Made In Space (now Redwire), and Varda Space Industries (pharmaceutical crystallization), all pursuing the premise that microgravity and vacuum enable novel manufacturing impossible or prohibitively expensive on Earth.