It’s Crunch Time for the Google Lunar X Prize Teams

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Doug Messier
on May 29, 2012, at 1:26 pm
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The moon rising over Half Moon Bay, California on Halloween 2009. (Credit: Douglas Messier)

Alexandra Hall, Senior Director of the Google Lunar X Prize Foundation, talked about the status of the lunar rover competition during the International Space Development Conference in Washington, DC, on Sunday.

It looks like things are getting down to the wire for many of the 26 teams. With a 2015 deadline looming, a long lead time in securing a booster, and many of the teams falling significantly short on raising money, it looks like the field will be significantly smaller by the end of the year.

Highlight from her talk are after the break.

Here are the essentials of Hall’s talk via Jeff Foust’s Twitter feed:

  • Hall: fully expect a reduction in number of GLXP teams (currently 26) in the next year due to mergers and dropouts.
  • Hall: the 1 real challenge for GLXP teams is raising money now: to get there by end-2015 deadline, need to make launch deals soon.
  • Hall: 46% of teams have raised less than one-quarter of funds they think they need; 35% will abandon or merge if don’t raise $ in 2012
  • Hall adds that several teams are confident of raising funding they need to win the prize.
  • Hall: 38% of GLXP teams looking for rideshare launch options; several thinking of putting their rover on another team’s lander.
  • Hall: 82% of teams would keep going if beaten by another team or a gov’t mission; want to prove out their business plan. #ISDC
  • Hall: polled teams why they’re in GLXP; 70% said to move space exploration forward, 65% saw it as excuse to start a business.
  • Hall: what does GLXP success look like? Not just landing on the Moon, but stimulating a fledging space economy.
  • Alex Hall: my job at GLXP is to increase the likelihood of success for teams competing; things I can do to make their lives easier.
  • Hall: GLXP helping teams by serving as “lunar chamber of commerce”, evangelizing potential markets and funding opportunities.
  • Hall: challenge in building public awareness of GLXP is timing: start too early and people get bored.
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