Category Archives: Japan

Tuesday / 9 December 2025

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ispace Collaborates for Moon Transportation Systems and Infrastructure

ispace of Japan has 300 employees worldwide, Tokyo, Luxembourg, USA offices; agrees with Japan Air Lines (JAL) to continue collaboration from Hakuto-R R&D Moon lander program into Initial Commercial Phase of lunar missions; ispace focus on economic Earth-Moon connection to be supported by JAL safe / secure travel, 70 years in air, now into space; ispace collaborating with Kurita Water Industries for lunar water resource development via technologies, feasibility assessments, payload planning / integration; upcoming collaborations with Draper USA for 2027 CLPS mission and Japan Ministry of Economy / Trade / Industry for 2028 Series 3 lander

Image Credits: Kurita Water Industries, ispace-inc, Japan Air Lines

Holiday Edition
Wed-Mon / 26 Nov – 1 Dec 2025

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ISRO and JAXA Collaborate for Lunar Synergy

JAXA delegation meets ISRO senior leadership, reviews progress on upcoming ~US$253M Lunar Polar Exploration Mission (LuPEX), tours UR Rao Satellite Centre, discusses potential collaboration to create robotic arm / launch science satellites / support researchers and private companies from both nations working jointly; ISRO LuPEX Moon lander – Chandrayaan-5 – carries ~250kg JAXA rover / instruments from NASA / ESA / JAXA / ISRO, will investigate quantity / quality of South Pole-region water ice, flies 2028-2029 on JAXA H3 rocket; ~US$250M Chandrayaan-4 lunar sample return launching 2027-2028

Image Credits: ISRO, JAXA

Friday / 24 October 2025

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ispace Innovation / Cooperation Offers Success Model for Lunar Advancement

ispace, inc. (Japan), developing Moon landers / rovers in HAKUTO-R program, planned to collect lunar regolith for US$5,000 and transfer ownership to NASA — evoking lunar property rights questions; subsidiary ispace-Europe signs 6 Oct US$22M Payload Services Agreement (PSA) with Magna Petra Corp. to deliver (via subsidiary ispace-USA APEX 1.0 lander / micro-rover) NASA MSOLO mass spectrometer for lunar Helium-3 prospecting under Magna Petra-NASA 5 May Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA); ispace signs 5 Sep MoU with Digantara (India) for cislunar awareness and 23 Oct with OrbitAID (India) for refueling, indirectly supporting ISRO-JAXA LUPEX / Chandrayaan-5 mission (JAXA rocket / rover, ISRO lander) launching NET 2028

Image Credits: ispace

Friday / 10 October 2025

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ispace Partners Internationally to Further Lunar Enterprise

ispace announces new business deals including JAXA ~US$6.5B Strategic Space Fund selects ispace to develop lunar-water-location orbiter in ~$42M project led by Institute of Science Tokyo, and ispace chooses 2 companies for lunar water projects: Takasago Thermal Engineering receives ~$19.5M of ispace shares to collaborate in finding lunar surface H2O, Kurita Water Industries invests ~$13M in ispace as they jointly develop lunar resources / infrastructure; payload service agreements in process: for Series 3 lander NET 2027 with Magna Petra for ~$22M to take NASA MSOLO, and Unmanned Exploration Laboratory (Korea) for 2 rovers; with Taiwan Space Agency for ~$8M to deliver NET 2028 magnetometer / UV telescope

Image Credits: ispace

Friday / 3 October 2025

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Europe Moves Forward with International Collaboration on Moon Missions for Exploration, Monitoring, Mining

Airbus (Netherlands / France, with German / USA / China / Canada offices) supplies European Service Module for Artemis II Orion spacecraft, providing life-support, avionics, solar power, propulsion; ESA Argonaut lunar lander planned to launch NET 2031; Blue Origin (USA / Luxembourg) teams with Luxembourg government / ESRIC / GOMSpace to create Oasis-1 orbiter to map water ice / H3 / rare minierals, before sending Blue Alchemist mining rig; Space Applications Services (Belgium) designing 300kg rover; ispace Europe awaits ESA approval for MAGPIE 30kg rover to analyze subsurface geology, hydrogen forms, et al

Image Credits: Airbus, Blue Origin, NASA

Friday / 26 September 2025

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Lunar Exploration Company ispace Furthers Mission: Expand Our Planet, Expand Our Future with MoU and IAC Events

Lander / rover company ispace, inc (TOKYO:9348; market cap ¥57B) signs MoU 25 Sep with transportation-focused ElevationSpace of Japan (¥3.7B raised since founding) for lunar sample return with re-entry capsule in development by ElevationSpace; ispace CEO Takeshi Hakamada (R) and ElevationSpace CEO Ryohei Kobayashi (L) also pledge to create related business opportunities for companies / governments worldwide; International Astronautical Congress (IAC) 28 Sep – 3 Oct in Sydney, Australia features 6 ispace Technical Sessions, ispace-U.S. CEO Elizabeth Kryst at the ispace booth 30 Sep 11:00, and reception 1 Oct 16:00 with sake and light refreshments; ispace divisions are in Japan, Luxembourg, USA

Image Credits: ispace, ElevationSpace

Tuesday / 9 September 2025

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World-Leading Spacefaring Countries Japan and India Working Toward Human Lunar Presence

India-Japan lunar collaboration advances through Tokyo summit with prime ministers, and signing of LuPEX Implementing Arrangement by JAXA VP Mayumi Matsuura and India Ambassador Sibi George; Chandrayaan-5 / LuPEX mission, duration 100-365 days, targets water ice at Moon south pole with ~6,000kg India lander carrying ~350kg JAXA rover via NET 2028 launch on JAXA H3-24L rocket; builds on Chandrayaan-3 Statio Shiv Shakti landing ~69°S and Chandrayaan-4 sample return NET 2027; new phase in space cooperation exemplified by commercial agreement between ispace Japan (~US$130m equity funding) and startup Digantara of India (~US$16m) to build cislunar infrastructure promoting sustained human presence on Moon

Image Credits: Office of the Prime Minister – India, JAXA, NASA

Tuesday / 3 June 2025

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ispace Moon Lander About 100km and 2 Days From Surface

ispace Resilience Lunar Lander completes Success 8 of 10 milestones 28 May, entering 100-km altitude circular orbit with 10-min engine burn, longest to date on this privately funded Mission 2, leaves elliptical orbit 70×5,800 km reached with 9-min burn 7 May; descent to Mare Frigoris 56°N 1°E begins from 100 km, higher than 30 km of Chandrayaan 3 and 20 km of Blue Ghost; global livestream in English and Japanese begins 1 hr before expected Moon landing 19:24 UTC 5 Jun / 04:24 JST 6 Jun

Credits: ispace

Tuesday / 20 May 2025

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JAXA Chief Offers Technology Partnership to Keep NASA Moon Missions On-Track

 JAXA President Hiroshi Yamakawa offers response to NASA budget proposal cutting ~6% of current US$24.8B, although not human exploration portion, says Japan has high-precision Moon landing technology, lunar rover, resupply capabilities and lunar water data to offer Artemis missions; emphasizes lunar Gateway or similar infrastructure needed, could include JAXA human habitation module created with ESA; SLS / Orion are 140% over budget at US$23B, cost US$4B per launch, had been planned to deploy Gateway; NASA budget proposal for FY 2026 beginning Oct 2025 earmarks over $7 billion for lunar exploration, introduces $1 billion in new investments for Mars-focused programs

Credits: JAXA

Friday / 16 May 2025

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ispace Lander in Lunar Orbit, 20 Days Ahead of Anticipated Moon Landing

 ispace 340-kg lunar craft Resilience in stable Moon orbit due to ~9-minute main thruster burn ahead of final maneuvers before anticipated 5 Jun (UTC) touchdown near Mare Frigoris with 5-kg rover Tenacious; rover will shovel regolith, analyze and send data; ispace aiming to fulfill US$5,000 NASA Lunar Regolith Transfer Contract; Resilience also carries water electrolyzer, food production experiment with algae, Moonhouse by artist Mikael Genberg, deep space radiation probe, UNESCO memory disk, commemorative plaque based on Charter of the Universal Century fictional document from Japanese science fiction franchise Gundam

Credits: ispace-Inc