Google has already taken the Internet by storm and is used by millions of people across the world. Now the Internet giant is hoping to expand its influence - to the moon. Google Inc. is bankrolling a $30 million prize to the first private company that can safely land a robotic rover on the moon and beam back a gigabyte of images and video to Earth.
Private space flights, while not being commonplace, are a reality these days and if the competition produces a winner it could be a major boon to the fledgling private spaceflight industry, as well as being the first time that a non-government entity has flown a lunar space probe.
Google partnered with the
X Prize Foundation for the moon challenge, which is open to companies around the world. The Santa Monica-based nonprofit prize institute is best known for hosting the Ansari X Prize contest, that led to the first manned private spaceflight in 2004.
Teams will raise money to build a roaming spacecraft that needs to be tough enough to survive a landing and have the smarts to complete a set of tasks. Each rover must also be equipped with high-definition video and still cameras to document the journey.
The rules call for a spacecraft to move at least 1,312 feet across the lunar surface and return a package of data including self-portraits, panoramic views and near-real time videos.
Whoever accomplishes this feat by 2012 will receive $20 million. If there is no winner, the purse will drop to $15 million until the end of 2014 when the contest expires. There is also a $5 million second-place prize and $5 million in bonus money to teams that go beyond the minimum requirements.
Google has had previous forays into space, albeit via the Internet by launching
Google Mars and
Google Earth, Web browser-based mapping tools that give users an up-close, interactive view with the click of a mouse.