There’s gold in them there hills. You know, those ones floating around in space. Asteroids contain many tons of precious metals, making them irresistible to scientists, aerospace engineers, futurists, fiction writers … and tech billionaires.
A group of wealthy, adventurous entrepreneurs will announce on Apr. 24 a new venture called Planetary Resources, Inc., which plans to send swarms of robots to space to scout asteroids for precious metals and set up mines to bring resources back to Earth, in the process adding trillions of dollars to the global GDP, helping ensure humanity’s prosperity and paving the way for the human settlement of space.