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“ ispace is developing robotic spacecraft to provide transportation services to space agencies , and then to commercial companies ,” summarised Hakamada . “ Our vision is to extend human life into outer space .”
Hakamada highlighted the increasing activity surrounding the moon , thanks to government space agencies . India ’ s Chandrayaan-2 , the US ’ Artemis Mission to land people on the moon by 2024 and Japan ’ s upcoming SLIM were all mentioned . But increasingly missions are being achieved with the collaboration of private companies , as demonstrated by NASA ’ s Commercial Crew in partnership with SpaceX and Boeing . “ ispace is developing a lunar lander and a rover to explore the surface of the moon . We take a different approach from the others . Our strength is to utilise Japanese production technology to lower the mass of the hardware , as much as possible . That enables us to lower the cost of missions and increase their number .”
Having constructed a rover just 4kg in weight , Hakamada hopes it can be used to explore the lunar surface for resources as well as potential sources
“ Our vision is to extend human life into outer space ”
— Takeshi Hakamada CEO , ispace
JANUARY 2020