Team Hakuto, a Japanese group competing for the Google Lunar X Prize, announced today it has a verified contract to fly its rover on another team’s lander in 2017 after its initial partner dropped out of the competition.
Team Hakuto said that it has an agreement with TeamIndus to fly its rover to the moon on the Indian team’s lander, and that the agreement has been verified by the X Prize Foundation. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
Teams in the Google Lunar X Prize, a competition to land a privately-developed spacecraft on the moon, travel at least 500 meters, and return video and other data, have until the end of the year to obtain a launch contract and have it verified by the X Prize Foundation. Teams that fail to do will not be allowed to continue in the competition. Teams that do remain in the competition have until the end of 2017 to launch their spacecraft.
