Japenese Startup To Partner With Indian Spacetech Startup To Land on Moon

Moon is once again an object of desire, courtesy tech giant Google, which under its aptly named Lunar XPRIZE competition is trying to inspire and challenge innovators, engineers, and entrepreneurs world to develop low-cost methods of robotic space exploration. The thing that makes the competition all the more lucrative is the $20 million prize amount that the winner will walk away with.

The latest contender which is almost very close to winning the Lunar XPRIZE is Team HAKUTO, a product of Japan-based startup ispace Inc. The startup has just obtained a launch vehicle to fulfil its plans to send to the Moon late next year.

Extending a helping hand to HAKUTO is India-based Team Indus, which already has a contract in its kitty for launching its own rover, aboard a rocket developed by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), in December next year. The two, Team HAKUTO and Team Indus, have entered into a partnership for the same.

Industry experts claim that for Team HAKUTO, whose much famous rideshare with team Astrobiotic recently went kaput, this partnership with Team Indus came at just the right time to secure itself a launch vehicle so as to be able to stay in competition for the X-Prize which closes by the end of this year.

Also famous as "NASCAR on the Moon," Lunar X-Prize's first position will go to the first private company that is successfully able to make a landing on the Moon, do a 500 meters (1,640 feet) -dash, and then is able to send high-definition photos and video back to planet Earth. While the first position gets $20 million, the second position gets $5 million. In order to win either of the prizes, the teams must be able to prove that 90% of their mission costs were funded by private sources. In addition to this, there is a separate $5 million prize money to be given as a bonus. This will be available to teams that are successful in meeting several "bonus" challenges, which includes making a trip to the Apollo sites, and discovering water ice.

It is interesting to note that the news about Team Hakuto competing for the Lunar X-Prize comes just a few days after PT Scientists, a German team, announced that it has been successful in securing a ride to the Moon for next year. Other contenders in contention for one of the biggest competition on Earth includes American company Moon Express and Israeli nonprofit SpaceIL.

The door is soon closing for the rest of the 16 teams of the Lunar X-Prize to book themselves tickets to orbit. Let's wait and watch who all make the cut.

[Top Image: japantimes.co.jp]

This Bangaluru-Based Startup Set To Launch India's First Privately Funded Space Mission

What can be considered a thing of real pride for India, a Bangaluru based startup, Team Indus, has become the winner of the first leg of the Google Lunar Xprize and earned itself a prize money of $1 million in funding. The space centric startup will use the funding to launch India’s first privately-funded space mission.

The space entrepreneurs from Team Indus are hopeful of launching a rover by July next year, which can then be expected to land on Moon's surface in approximately 20 days after the launch. The rover is said to weigh around 20kgs, and will be capable of carrying a payload of 250 grams.

According to the current plans, the rover will be launched from the much famous Sriharikota space centre in India. Apparently, Team Indus is receiving immense support from ISRO with a few former ISRO scientists even providing their expertise for this first-ever privately-funded space mission. The entire project is said to be worth over a gigantic $60 million.

According to the space startup, it took them a total of five long years to ideate and conceptualise the entire project from front to back. Further, after they saw that no other Indian startup was taking part in the Google competition, they decided to take the plunge.



What makes this particular private space mission so special is the fact that it is taking into account public opinion in order to narrow down what should be actually sent as the 250 grams payload with the rover to the moon in 2017. In order to arrive at the final decision, the startup has launched an event 'Lab 2 Moon’, where it has asked suggestions from 14-25 years aged students for the 250 gram payload.



Launched in the year 2007, the main idea behind the Google Lunar Xprize competition is to attract space entrepreneurs towards creating affordable access to the Moon and beyond by incentivising them.

According to the rules of the competition, any team which is successfully able to land a privately funded rover on the moon, which then travels 500 meters, and transmits back high definition video and image, will be awarded with a prize money of $30 million.

The first team emerging victorious by completing the mission walks home with a prize money of $20 million, while the second position team gets $5 million in prize money.

Hence, Bangaluru's Team Indus isn't solo in this battle of the highly competitive space voyage race. Here's wishing Team Indus all the very best, so that it becomes the first among its counterparts to land on the moon and also simultaneously that final prize money amount of a whopping $20 million.

Bangalore's Team Indus Bags Google Lunar Xprize of $1 million To Land Robot On Moon

Last year we reported that how a startup from Bangalore - Team Indus has successfully chosen for Google space mission, now the latest update is that Team Indus has been successful in making India proud by becoming the first private enterprise that will land a robot on the moon. The Bengaluru based Startup has also won $1 million in prize for competing with some world class companies and completing an intermediate milestone.

Founded by Indranil Chakraborty, Rahul Narayan and Julius Amrit, Team Indus is one of the five lucky teams in the $30 million Google Lunar Xprize. The startup was successful in crossing a major milestone by developing a robot that is capable of landing on the moon and then travel five hundred meters on its surface and send back information to the Earth.

The Bengaluru startup has raised seed capital funding from a number of investors in the past. Some of the famous names are Sharad Sharama, the founding member of thinktank Ispirt, Shekhar Kirani and Subrata Mitra of Accel Partners and Vivek Raghavan, chief product manager of UIDAI.

According to Vivek Wadhwa, an entrepreneur turned academic, “This is good news for India for sure, but it is a better news for mankind because it shows that governments no longer have a monopoly on space exploration.”

The Bengaluru based startup is battling it out with some of the top private funded companies from all around the word. The companies include Space-IL, an Israel based company backed by several top-notch Israeli institutions, Astrobotic, which is a spinoff from the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute and Moon Express.

Around 26 best teams from all around the world are competing in the Google Lunar Xprize. The mission is expected to cost a whopping $30 million, when it is complete. “I expect it will inspire Indian entrepreneurs to solve many big problems that the country has,” added Wadhwa.

Xprize was launched in India last month. It is an incentive driven competition that has an aim of bringing together problem solvers from all across the globe to take on big challenges head on. India is the first country for Xprize outside the United States of America. Industry veteran Ratan Tata, Paresh Ghelani of BPG Motors and Naven Jain of Inome are the famous names responsible for bringing Xprize to India.

Bangalore's Team Indus Bags Google Lunar Xprize of $1 million To Land Robot On Moon

Last year we reported that how a startup from Bangalore - Team Indus has successfully chosen for Google space mission, now the latest update is that Team Indus has been successful in making India proud by becoming the first private enterprise that will land a robot on the moon. The Bengaluru based Startup has also won $1 million in prize for competing with some world class companies and completing an intermediate milestone.

Founded by Indranil Chakraborty, Rahul Narayan and Julius Amrit, Team Indus is one of the five lucky teams in the $30 million Google Lunar Xprize. The startup was successful in crossing a major milestone by developing a robot that is capable of landing on the moon and then travel five hundred meters on its surface and send back information to the Earth.

The Bengaluru startup has raised seed capital funding from a number of investors in the past. Some of the famous names are Sharad Sharama, the founding member of thinktank Ispirt, Shekhar Kirani and Subrata Mitra of Accel Partners and Vivek Raghavan, chief product manager of UIDAI.

According to Vivek Wadhwa, an entrepreneur turned academic, “This is good news for India for sure, but it is a better news for mankind because it shows that governments no longer have a monopoly on space exploration.”

The Bengaluru based startup is battling it out with some of the top private funded companies from all around the word. The companies include Space-IL, an Israel based company backed by several top-notch Israeli institutions, Astrobotic, which is a spinoff from the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute and Moon Express.

Around 26 best teams from all around the world are competing in the Google Lunar Xprize. The mission is expected to cost a whopping $30 million, when it is complete. “I expect it will inspire Indian entrepreneurs to solve many big problems that the country has,” added Wadhwa.

Xprize was launched in India last month. It is an incentive driven competition that has an aim of bringing together problem solvers from all across the globe to take on big challenges head on. India is the first country for Xprize outside the United States of America. Industry veteran Ratan Tata, Paresh Ghelani of BPG Motors and Naven Jain of Inome are the famous names responsible for bringing Xprize to India.