page_title: Armadillo Aerospace
section_title: Research and development principles
hierarchical_section_title: Armadillo Aerospace / Research and development principles
caption_attribution_description: English: Captive test flight of Armadillo Aerospace's Pixel rocket before the 2006 X-Prize Cup.
context_page_description: Armadillo Aerospace was an aerospace startup company based in Mesquite, Texas. Its initial goal was to build a crewed suborbital spacecraft capable of space tourism, and it had also stated long-term ambitions of orbital spaceflight. The company was founded by John Carmack, former co-founder and chief technical officer of id Software.
  On October 24, 2008, Armadillo won $350,000 by succeeding in the Level 1 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge. On September 12, 2009, Armadillo won $500,000 by succeeding in Level 2 of the same challenge.
  In 2010, they signed an exclusive deal with Space Adventures. Armadillo Aerospace was to provide a sub-orbital rocket to fly tourists into space, while Space Adventures would sell tickets for the experience.
  In August 2013, Carmack announced that Armadillo Aerospace had been put in "hibernation mode", following setbacks including the crash of the STIG-B rocket in January 2013.
  In May 2014, several former employees of Armadillo Aerospace formed a new company, Exos Aerospace, which was created to carry their former company's research into reusable commercial space craft.
context_section_description: The company placed a strong emphasis on a rapid build and test cycle.  Armadillo Aerospace designed and built more than 12 vehicles which used about 50 engine designs for over 100 rocket flights.  Each design had several features in common.  One was the use of modern computer technologies and electronics to simplify rocket control and reduce development costs.  Another was the use of liquid propellants and VTVL to facilitate short launch-to-launch times.
caption: Captive test flight of Armadillo Aerospace's Pixel rocket before the 2006 X-Prize Cup.
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2008:10:13 22:19:41", "Image ExifOffset": "220", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "458", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4019", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2006:10:08 17:16:24", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:10:05 19:47:45", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1514", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1082"}