If media reports are to be believed then ISRO’s commercial arm ANTRIX Corporation have called it quits on the launch contract signed to pursue the $30-million. Google Lunar XPRIZE Goal. XPRIZE rules means the funding has to be strictly private for the teams.
TeamIndus had reportedly aimed to land on the moon by 31 March 2018 using ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).They popularised it with the Har India Ka Moonshot slogan. It was the only Indian team in the challenge. Google Lunar XPRIZE is a competition which is aiming to inspire engineers and innovators to come up with low-cost methods of robotic space exploration. To win the competition, the team needs to successfully place a space probe on the moon’s surface, make it travel at least 500 meters and then transmit HD video and images back to Earth.
The winner gets $20 million, while the second place team gets $5 million. TeamIndus is India’s first private aerospace startup and also a participant in the Lunar XPRIZE. According to a report in The Ken, multiple ISRO sources have confirmed to it that TeamIndus will not be getting the PSLV rocket as TeamIndus could not generate funds needed to pay for the launch and operations beyond.Business Insider also has confirmed with its sources. Both ANTRIX and TeamIndus have reportedly stayed mum on the situation. The Ken had earlier reported that TeamIndus was already late in reaching its technical milestones and it was evident that even if they had received the required funding, logistical and technical failures would have made it impossible to meet the 31 March deadline set by Lunar XPRIZE.
According to the report, critical hardware such as the Inertial Measurement Unit, a key component in the navigation system that’s needed to track the spacecraft’s position and speed while descent, arrived till late last year along with many other parts. Other reports include Management issues while some leaving the company for unpaid salaries. Management issues were an other reason.
Ken reports that there were steady exits from the startup as salaries and payments became erratic. “The leadership team disintegrated on the issues of PR [public relations], funding and lack of technological progress,” Ken quotes a source as saying. According to the report, Google Lunar XPRIZE finalist, Japan’s Team Hakuto was also hitching a ride with TeamIndus and it is currently not known what their status is.However, its not just TeamIndus that is struggling. According to a report by Space.com, the team from Israel ‘SpaceII’ too, needed to raise $7.5 million by December 20, failing which, it would have to drop out of the challenge.
However, this should not be taken to mean the end of TeamIndus, as the report says that there is still potential for TeamIndus to partner with ISRO for future space missions. People close to the company have claimed that TeamIndus had participated in conferences where ‘moon habitats’ were debated and got a positive response. Hopefully we will see more of TeamIndus soon. Many fans including me are proud of what it has achieved so far.
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