Google Lunar X Prize

The Google Lunar X Prize (GLXP) was a 2007–2018 inducement prize space competition organized by the X Prize Foundation, and sponsored by Google. The challenge called for privately funded teams to be the first to land a lunar rover on the Moon, travel 500 meters, and transmit back to Earth high-definition video and images. The original deadline was the end of 2014, with additional prize money for a landing by 2012. In 2015, XPRIZE announced that the competition deadline would be extended to December 2017 if at least one team could secure a verified launch contract by 31 December 2015. Two teams secured such a launch contract, and the deadline was extended. In August 2017, the deadline was extended again, to 31 March 2018. Entering 2018, five teams remained in the competition: SpaceIL, Moon Express, Synergy Moon, TeamIndus, and Team Hakuto, having secured verified launch contracts with Spaceflight Industries, Rocket Lab, Interorbital Systems, and ISRO (jointly for the last two teams). On 23 January 2018, the X Prize Foundation announced that "no team would be able to make a launch attempt to reach the Moon by the [31 March 2018] deadline...and the US$30 million Google Lunar XPRIZE will go unclaimed." On 5 April 2018, the X Prize Foundation announced that the Lunar XPRIZE would continue as a non-cash competition. On 11 April 2019, the SpaceIL Beresheet spacecraft crashed while attempting to land on the moon. The SpaceIL team was awarded a $1 million "Moonshot Award" by the X Prize Foundation in recognition of touching the surface of the Moon.