Tag Archives: xprize

Team Indus gears up for second chance at Lunar XPRIZE

Posted on by
Reply

India’s first private sector space agency Team Indus is gearing up for the XPRIZE lunar launch giving final touches to its stalled latest mini rover meant for lunar landing.

Since Team Indus failed to raise funds for ISRO-backed PSLV launch, it could not meet the deadline set by Google as of March 31, 2018. Eventually, Google withdrew the prize money of $30 million and called it off.

Now that XPRIZE, which had successfully launched similar scientific missions in the past has renewed its mission to undertake the Lunar XPRIZE and Bangalore-based Team Indus emerges with renewed vigour.

Team Indus founder and CEO Rahul Narayan was upbeat. “The Google Lunar XPRIZE served as an excellent early catalyst to get new people, partners and money involved. With the renewed interest in beyond Earth-orbit exploration by multiple large government space agencies, a new Lunar XPRIZE will be a perfectly timed platform with the chances of multiple successful launches being much higher than before,” he said.

Under the terms of Google XPRIZE competition, the space company or its competitors have to make a soft-landing of their lunar rover, which should traverse at least 500 metres and send high-quality images back to the ground control on the earth. However, the new parameters will be re-defined now, said XPRIZE in a statement.

While Team Indus was seen as a sure-shot winner with its progress in designing the lunar rover and displaying it at several space events in India and abroad, the company failed to raise the required funds to pay for ISRO’s PSLV launcher.

Since 2007, Google Lunar XPRIZE teams have raised over $300 million through corporate sponsorships, government contracts and venture capital. As of 2017 January, Team Indus from India, Japan’s HAKUTO, Israel-based SpaceIL, American firms Moon Express and Synergy Moon were selected out of the 33 teams from 17 countries for the $1 million initial prize. However, the failure of any of them to raise next round of funds forced Google to withdraw the $30 million grand prize.

Chanda Gonzales-Mowrer, Senior Director of XPRIZE, said: “These space entrepreneurs are developing long-term business models around lunar transportation and we cannot give up on them now.”

All the Lunar XPRIZE startups are equally enthusiastic to participate in the Lunar XPRIZE competition without a monetary prize but the organisers are hopeful to find a new sponsor to replace elusive Google. Peter H. Diamandis, XPRIZE founder and executive chairman said, “XPRIZE is now looking for our next visionary Title Sponsor who wants to put their logo on these teams and on the lunar surface.”

Bob Richards, founder & CEO of Moon Express welcomed XPRIZE decision to renew the competition. “While we plan to win this Moon race and are committed to carrying the Lunar XPRIZE logo, the real opportunity is in opening the lunar frontier and the multibillion dollar industry that follows.”

Takeshi Hakamada, founder and CEO of Japan’s space firm iSpace, which has designed HAKUTO, echoed similar views when he said, “We believe a new competition would again elevate our industry to an even higher level, so we eagerly welcome a new Lunar XPRIZE.”

While all eyes are on a new Title Sponsor, whoever pitches in would have the benefit of having their name and branding incorporated into the competition, and in success, on the surface of the Moon, said XPRIZE.

XPRIZE had conducted the $20M NRG COSIA Carbon XPRIZE, the $15M Global Learning XPRIZE, the $10M ANA Avatar XPRIZE, the $7M Shell Ocean Discovery XPRIZE, the $7M Barbara Bush Foundation Adult Literacy XPRIZE, the $5M IBM Watson AI XPRIZE, the $1.75M Water Abundance XPRIZE and the $1M Anu and Naveen Jain Women’s Safety XPRIZE in the past.

Team Indus Pitches for $40 Mln Funding to Emerge as India’s Equivalent of SpaceX

Posted on by
Reply

Team Indus, the only Indian team competing for the Google Lunar XPRIZE, wants to go beyond the challenge and emerge as India’s equivalent of SpaceX, US private space company, with an eye on additional fund-raising to the tune of $40 million in the next round.

With its lunar rover mission launch set for December aboard ISRO’s PSLV rocket, Team Indus wants to expand its operational capabilities in launching and managing communication satellites.

The $30M Google Lunar XPRIZE challenge is a global competition to inspire engineers and entrepreneurs to develop low-cost methods of robotic space exploration by a privately funded team. The team must successfully place a robot on the Moon that explores at least 500 meters and transmits high-definition video and images back to Earth.

Team Indus has already raised $20 million in its first round from the country’s top investors such as Ratan Tata, Nandan Nilekani, Sachin Bansal, Binny Bansal, Subrata Mitra and Shekhar Kirani. The next round of funding will be utilized for expansion of its North Bangalore facility to undertake more space launches, said Team Indus founder Rahul Narayan.

The upcoming mission will carry its rover and 11 other payloads from Japan, France and UAE in the moon-laning mission. The spacecraft is under development at National Aerospace Laboratories (NAL) and the final assembly will be done at the Team Indus facility in North Bengaluru.

Elaborating on their moon landing mission, Narayan told TOI: “ISRO’s Chandrayaan 1 was an orbital mission, while our spacecraft has to land on the Moon.” The flight testing of the spacecraft and payloads will be done at ISRO’s facility, before the final launch, he said.

Since ISRO is planning to employ a private launch vehicle by 2020, Team Indus sees imense potential and emerge as the country’s top private spacecraft manufacturer. “We see ourselves augmenting ISRO’s capacities, not capabilities,” Narayan said.

Team Indus is among the five teams to have been awarded a combined $5.25 million in recognition of “key technological advancements toward their quest to land a private spacecraft on the surface of the moon,” said the Xprize Foundation. The successful landing will get the team the final prize amount of $15 million.

Peter Diamandis, Lunar XPRIZE founder, while announcing the prize, said:”It has been many decades since we explored the Moon from the lunar surface, and it could be another 6–8 years before any government returns. Even then, it will be at a large expense, and probably with little public involvement.”

While the ideas initially mooted by Peter Diamandis, NASA was facing budget constraints, he approached Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, at an X Prize Foundation fundraiser and they agreed to sponsor it, and raise the amount of the prize money to $30 million, including a second prize, besides some bonus prizes. However, it was brought down to $15 million later.