The Japanese company ispace announces the launch of two missions on the Moon in 2020 and 2021

A Japanese company that hopes to explore the moon says it has bought space in the next two flights of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket to transport spacecraft to the lunar surface. These missions, planned for 2020 and 2021, are supposed to serve as crucial technological demonstrations for the company, called ispace, which one day aims to become a lunar delivery service.

The first of two ispace missions is to put a spacecraft in orbit around the moon. If that succeeds, the company will launch its second mission – a mission including a lunar lander and rovers to explore the surface of the Moon. All ispace hardware will be used as a secondary payload on Falcon 9 flights; that means they'll be moving on larger vehicles that launch into space and deploy separately. The rockets will drop the spaceship into an orbit high above the Earth, and the vehicles will travel the rest of the way to the moon.

"We share the vision with SpaceX to allow humans to live in space. We are therefore very pleased that they are joining us in this first leg of our journey, "said Takeshi Hakamada, founder and CEO of ispace.

For years, ispace has focused on the moon. The company initially oversaw a finalist team in the $ 30 million Lunar X Prize contest, a contest to send the first private spaceship to the moon. For the competition, the team developed a lunar rover called HAKUTO, which means "white rabbit". The name is based on Japanese folklore, which involves a rabbit living on the surface of the moon. and the organizers announced that none of the finalists would visit the moon before the deadline of March 31 this year, adding that cash prizes would return to Google.

Image: ispace

However, many finalist teams continue to advance with their lunar ambitions. ispace, who oversaw the HAKUTO team, uses what he learned from the X Prize contest to make these next trips even more robust. The company will not use the mobile it has developed for X Prize. However, the rovers for the second mission are based on the framework of the original HAKUTO rover. They have been upgraded to increase their overall power, the distance they can travel and the amount of cargo they can carry – up to 5.5 pounds of extra room. They will also carry an internal sensor that will look for water.

Meanwhile, the lander that this built space is completely new. In the X Prize contest, ispace did not plan to build a lander. Instead, the team has committed to piloting its HAKUTO rover on a landing gear of a finalist TeamIndus. Now it seems that the contract has been canceled. ispace will make its way up to the lunar surface, developing a concept of LG design that the company revealed at the end of last year. The LG is intended to demonstrate a soft landing on the lunar surface and serve as a communication relay for rovers during their exploration.

But before the lunar lander and the rovers arrive on the Moon, ispace will attempt to demonstrate that it can place a spacecraft into lunar orbit. This vehicle, if successfully inserted, will remain in orbit for one to two months, testing the navigation cameras that the space plans to use for the landing gear and rover mission. He will also take images of the lunar surface and send these images to Earth.

Since ispace East Drawing on the material that he developed for the X Prize contest, the company decided to name his inaugural HAKUTO-R missions, along with the "R" for reboot. Designs for the lunar spacecraft have recently undergone a preliminary design review, according to the company. A panel of 26 experts from the Japanese space agency, as well as from Europe and the United States, said that the design was feasible and that spaces were needed to work on a few "key actions". , and the company plans to test in the spring of 2019, the assembly starting in the summer of this year.

Image: SpaceX

ispace, headquartered in Japan, Luxembourg and the United States, has raised nearly $ 95 million and will use this money to help fund these first two Falcon 9 flights. In the end, ispace hopes to build an infrastructure sustainable space by delivering instruments to the Moon to customers and using water found on the Moon as a resource for future space travel.

"We are entering a new era in space exploration and SpaceX is proud to have been selected by ispace to launch its first lunar missions," SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said in a statement. "We are looking forward to delivering their innovative spaceship to the moon."

ispace is not the only former X Prize team that SpaceX will help to reach the lunar surface. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is also planned to carry an Israeli lander later this year, one that was developed by the former X SpaceIL Prix Finalist team. This lander is expected to land on the Moon in early 2019. Another former X Prize team, Astrobotic, plans to launch its landing gear, called Peregrine, on a United Launch Alliance's Atlas V rocket in mid-2020.

So, if all goes well, the next two years could be a busy time on the lunar surface, with many private companies exploring what the Moon has to offer.

Update of September 26 at 9:30 am ET: This article has been updated to include more information about the missions of a follow-up press conference.