Only private team from India.
When Rahul Narayan started a software startup back in 2010, he never thought his ideas would perhaps end up on the moon.
Narayan’s company was involved in developing products for e-commerce companies, but when Google announced the Google Lunar X-Prize completion, Narayan was genuinely interested and now, the progress he made in creating a rover that can move on the lunar surface, makes him the frontrunner in winning the prize.
Google Lunar X-Prize competition announced in 2007 invited companies to build a rover that can move at least 500 meters on the lunar surface and send high-resolution images and videos of earth’s satellite.
Narayan’s team “Indus” is the only private company to represent India in the Google Lunar X-Prize completion which has 16 teams competing for a chance to go to the moon and win the $30 million prize.
Team Indus has won one Milestone Prize: the Landing Prize, for a total of $1 million in prize winnings and is all set to land the rover on moon next year.
According to the official website of Google Lunar X-Prize, “Team Indus’ Mission is a celebration of all things great about India – the audacious goal, the young bright engineers, the can-do entrepreneurial spirit, partners who commit their resources, and the new breed of world-class entrepreneurs who have supported our mission – all of whom are united by a vision to deliver a best-in-class technology outcome entirely out of India.”
In a milestone achievement that no other competing teams have achieved, Team Indus has successfully convinced the ISRO to launch a rocket carrying its rover to Moon in December 2017, thus becoming the first private company to get a dedicated rocket built by ISRO.
Going by the rules of theGoogle Lunar X-Prize, the teams should privately fund 90% of the mission cost and have to secure the contract of a space agency before the end of 2016. The launch must happen in 2017.
The operation needs to be 90 percent privately funded, and the launch contract needs to be secured with a space agency before 2016.
Team Indus has been working with the Indian space organization since 2014 and they have been working on the project since 2012. If things work as planned, the rover will blast off in a PSLV rocket on December 28, 2017, and will land on the lunar surface on January 28, 2018.
“What gave us confidence to dream big when we started on this journey many years back was the heft of the scientific legacy that India, with ISRO, created over decades. This launch contract reaffirms our mission as a truly Indian mission where the best of India’s public and private enterprises have come together to realize a common dream,” said Narayan, TeamIndus’ Fleet Commander.
“As far as simulation, design, and analysis go, we’re 90 percent sure of ourselves. Touchdown can be tricky, but I’d say we’re about 75 percent sure about,” he added. “Recently European Space Agency’s mars rover crashed destroying nearly nine months of their work. We believe we have an advantage compared to the other teams because we have an indigenous ecosystem available for us thanks to ISRO.”
Team Indus designed the lunar rover as a complete “Made in India” project in order to cut the cost. Close to 100 people have worked on the project which also includes 20 retired ISRO scientists. The Indian team got funding from private firms, including that of Ratan Tata’s.
The PSLV rocket carrying the rover will lift off to an orbit 880km x 70,000 km above the earth from where the spacecraft will commence its 21 days’ travel to the moon. It will land in the north-western hemisphere of the Moon.