Indian Tech Project Launches Int’l Competition for Young Space Enthusiasts

The challenge "Lab2Moon," involving young enthusiasts between ages 14-25 years, was launched on Wednesday by the aerospace research organization TeamIndus. The participants of the competition will have to imagine, design and build a project that would catalyze the evolution of mankind as a sustainable multi-planetary species, a company statement said. The payload will be carried to the Moon on the TeamIndus spacecraft within the Google Lunar XPRIZE competition.

 

To participate, teams of up to three members will be required to write a 300-word overview of their project, share drawings and upload a two-minute video explaining why it should go to the Moon. The registration for the competition opened on June 28 and closes on August 20.

The Google Lunar XPRIZE mission, created in 2007 by X Prize Foundation and sponsored by Google, aims to incentivize space entrepreneurs to create a new era of affordable access to the Moon and beyond. The competitors will have to land a privately funded lunar rover, travel 500 meters and transmit back HD video and images. The mission has a prize fund of $30 million, $20 million of which will go to the first team to successfully complete the mission objectives, states an overview on the program's official website.

TeamIndus, the only Indian startup competing for the Google Lunar XPRIZE, is currently among the top three teams. As long as at least 90% of the missions' cost must come from private funding, the competition marks "the first opportunity for a non-government experiment to fly to the moon since 1976," according to TeamIndus.