7 ms·

Japanese startup Ispace raises $90M, targets landing on moon surface by 2020

159 points by lnguyen 9y ago

melling 9y ago
First, we should accelerate building better robots to do the work of humans, then send thousands throughout the solar system. This will be cheaper and faster than manned space flight... Anyway, I went through this a few years ago on HN after the Virgin Galactic accident. People argued that it was only a minor setback. Any setback that involves humans costs a lot of money and time.
- Bob2019 9y ago
  Such a simple and elegant solution. We could also upload our minds into said robots remotely.
  - lwansbrough 9y ago
    So simple!
    - melling 9y ago
      No one said it would be easy. You guys added that. It would be difficult and expensive, but cheaper, faster, and easier than man space flight.
      - deerpig 9y ago
        So you would prefer JFK to have said: "We choose to send robots to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, because they are easy and cheaper and faster..." It's worth reading the whole speech: https://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/ricetalk.htm https://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/ricetalk.htm It ends with: "Well, space is there, and we're going to climb it, and the moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God's blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embarked." There will as many robots as you want in space, but man will be out there right along with them, no matter how difficult or dangerous or expensive it is.
        melling 9y ago
        Let me blog it. I get tired of answering this question. The short answer is if we had built robots and sent hundreds into space, we'd have more humans in space now because it would be safer and cheaper. We'd also learn more quickly. We'd also have more advanced robots because of the investment. We reached the moon, spent a few years, then gave up because of cost. Would you rather have a new robotic explorer, or two or three, queued for Mars, Titan, etc every year or a few people on Mars by 2040?
        cevn 9y ago
        Totally agreed. We could have an army of terraforming robots establish a space on Mars, for instance, then send humans there when we're sure it's hospitable. Or send drones throughout the galaxy with human embryos to potential habitable planets. An ethics nightmare, to be sure, but interesting to consider the implications nonetheless.
      - pavel_lishin 9y ago
        > cheaper, faster, and easier We don't know that, right? We don't know how much it would cost to develop the tech; we don't know how long it would take; we don't know how difficult it would be. It might actually be cheaper to send canned apes throughout the solar system, than human minds in robot bodies; we just don't know yet. This is at best a Fermi problem, where we can start throwing numbers out and hope our estimates are within a few orders of magnitude.
        melling 9y ago
        We send what we have now then iterate. Release early, release often. Funding robotics, AI, etc is not a NASA funded goal but goes under defense budget, tax deductions for industry, etc. The real problem is getting the money for space. No one wants to write a big check for Mars. They’ll write big checks for the Pentagon, automation in manufacturing, and strategic national goals.
        pavel_lishin 9y ago
        I was talking specifically about mind uploads.
  - gscott 9y ago
    I am not sure if we want to upload our minds... then the robots would be humping each other endlessly and never get anything done.
- indubitable 9y ago
  Curiosity cost us about $2 billion and it has some of the most state of the art systems on board. Among these was its drill, which was supposed to provide some of the most important science from the mission. And as my use of past tense probably belies, it broke after 15 activations. [1] Redundancies and the best NASA has on it notwithstanding, it remains broken. They've now, a year later, developed a high risk idea to try to get some drilling done. We'll see how that works out. This would have been something a human on site could have repaired in relatively short order. The point is that robotics and other technologies are advancing extremely rapidly, but they're still not anywhere even remotely close to being able to compare to humans in general purpose functionality - let alone improvisation. Don't forget that those amazing videos of Atlas are the result of countless takes and on-site specialization. This [2] article describes the results of the most recent DARPA Robotics Challenge which featured all the big names, including Atlas. The competition included tasks like walking, opening a door, and climbing up stairs. The most ostensibly difficult would be navigating a specially modified vehicle after having humans carefully place and suspend their robot inside it. And the developers all knew ahead of time exactly what the tasks would be and the circumstance, except for one surprise task which ended up being pulling a lever. The long and short is that it was a disaster. Quoting the article: "If there's a single lesson from the [DARPA Robotics Challenge], it's that humanoid robots are falling robots. Also, that the road to humanoids that aren't so clumsy will be long, and strewn with shattered components. If DARPA doesn't hold another version of the DRC, then the first one will have been little more than a grim status update, and a self-contained failure, for the few of us that realized it happened." The point here is that we are a long ways away from robots that can remotely compare to humans for general purpose tasks. The timeline for getting to the Moon and even to Mars on the other hand is very near future. -- Beyond all this, space exploration is not just about science. Did you know China put a probe on the moon in 2013? Technically it was a rover, but back to those robotics problems - it became a probe. It was the first time anything had soft landed on the moon since 1976. If you did know this you're probably already a huge enthusiast in the field because the world collectively yawned, even though it made some groundbreaking discoveries including discovering the moon's geographic makeup was far different than we thought. That discovery is playing no minor role in driving the recent moon race. But people want to see and discover space themselves. And there are lots of people willing to pay lots of money for the privilege. Two individuals have already purchased a Moon flyby from SpaceX - scheduled for next year. And even though a flyby is nothing compared to a soft landing, that will not be met with a yawn. Action requires money. Money requires public drive. Public drive requires manned operations. [1] - http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2017/0906-curiosity-balky-drill-problem.html http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2017/0906-cu... [2] - https://www.popsci.com/darpa-robotics-challenge-was-bust-why-darpa-needs-try-again https://www.popsci.com/darpa-robotics-challenge-was-bust-why...
- pikchurn 9y ago
  Robots don't get anywhere near the effectiveness of boots on the ground, even with the most advanced robotic explorers we have today. All of the science done by the Martian rovers could have been done by a human geologist in a few hours work (except the traversal itself, so let's add a day's hike on top of a few hours lab work). And the robots are only really able to inspect the stuff that happens to be exposed on the ground around them and easily reached by limited robotic manipulators. Sending humans to Mars for even a 30-day mission would be orders of magnitude more science return than the entire robotic exploration program to date. And that's without considering relativity time-lag. There's serious consideration of an orbital precursor mission to Mars that would put robotic handlers in Martian orbit, or a free-return trajectory near Mars, without a lander, to do little more than remote control a couple of Curiosity-style rovers that accompany them (and maybe visit one or both low-gravity martian moons). It's anticipated that the time-lag reduction alone could vastly increase the amount of science that could be done on a robotic mission before the nuclear batteries die or servos get clogged with dust. And of course all the robotic arguments are predicated on basic science being the only reason to go in the first place. In reality, most of the people interested in Mars and space exploration generally want people to permanently settle in space. I actually don't give a damn whether there was once life on Mars.. but there damn well better be human societies there within my lifetime.
  - melling 9y ago
    "Robots don't get anywhere near the effectiveness of boots on the ground, even with the most advanced robotic explorers we have today" Yes, that's why I said we accelerate the research into robotics. No one wants to fund NASA to go to Mars. It'll cost $200 billion to get a dozen people there, then it'll cost even more to stay. The DoD can spend a few billion in R&D, and that's a small project. We can give tax credits for R&D to private industry. The research doesn't even go on the NASA budget.
    - pikchurn 9y ago
      I think you don't understand the vast chasm between robotic capability and humans, and what can reasonably be done to close that gap. You're talking about making some sort of robotic geologist/biologist in the literal sense -- a humanoid robot or equivalent functionality that is space hardened, resists abrasive dust like nothing we have on Earth, requires no on-site maintenance, and is autonomous enough to operate for 10's of minutes at a time as good as it would be if humans were at the helm and it was next door. I don't think you understand the scale of those requirements. It would be cheaper to send humans, even at absolutely ridiculous Apollo-on-steroid prices.
sushibowl 9y ago
Can you really get to the moon with just $90M? My impression is that SpaceX is just about the cheapest launch provider currently available, and they charge something like $50-60M to get to orbit. And then you need to do all the tech required to land on the lunar surface as well. Do they anticipate getting additional funding or decreasing costs?
- melling 9y ago
  https://lunar.xprize.org https://lunar.xprize.org
- azernik 9y ago
  They're the cheapest (probably) per kilogram; but if you're willing to settle for smaller payloads, you can get to orbit for quite a lot cheaper. For example, the European Vega will get you 2.5T to LEO for under $40M. Half your budget on launch costs isn't bad.
  - sushibowl 9y ago
    This article has some more details on their plans. Apparently they're looking to launch as a secondary payload on something like a falcon 9: http://spacenews.com/japanese-lunar-exploration-company-ispace-raises-90-million/ http://spacenews.com/japanese-lunar-exploration-company-ispa... I'm not sure if launching as a secondary decreases costs. They do have two missions planned apparently, after which they hope to start generating revenue by carrying up to 30kg of customer payload to the moon per launch.
- QAPereo 9y ago
  It costs roughly $4000/lb to LEO, and the rocket equation makes the whole thing pretty unforgiving with current tech.
- pikchurn 9y ago
  I would imagine the initial funding does not include the cost of the rocket. The risk of this effort is not in the trans-lunar stage. Reliable solutions for that can be purchased off the shelf. A seed-stage company needs to prove out the custom tech required for its own application, then if there's a business case what they're doing in the first place they can go raise additional funding at a higher valuation to cover the cost of launch. No reason to suffer many times more dilution on that now.
sleepychu 9y ago
This is just them investing $90M in bitcoin right? To the moon...
philyalater 9y ago
If NASA hasn't made it back to the moon for decades and all it takes is $90M, they are doing something seriously wrong.
dplgk 9y ago
A lot less money than it takes to build a social network.
casualtech 9y ago
Huh. Is Japan company trying to reach to the moon? Haha.
- quadrature 9y ago
  Hey, take a look at the guidelines for HN. Its preferrable to have comments here that have something to offer to the discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
vkou 9y ago
Is this an Onion piece? Or something from the Beaverton? They want to land on the moon... To set up a billboard? And here I thought that the Silicon Valley model of startups making money by advertising other startups that make money by advertising other startups was insane. Oh... They want to start a space economy. That's great, but there is no mention of what will that space economy do. They will maybe consider mining water, for a potential future human settlement that will... Do what? They will put up a billboard, to advertise... To whom?

159 points by lnguyen 9y ago

First, we should accelerate building better robots to do the work of humans, then send thousands throughout the solar system. This will be cheaper and faster than manned space flight... Anyway, I went through this a few years ago on HN after the Virgin Galactic accident. People argued that it was only a minor setback. Any setback that involves humans costs a lot of money and time.

Bob2019 9y ago
Such a simple and elegant solution. We could also upload our minds into said robots remotely.
- lwansbrough 9y ago
  So simple!
  - melling 9y ago
    No one said it would be easy. You guys added that. It would be difficult and expensive, but cheaper, faster, and easier than man space flight.
    - deerpig 9y ago
      So you would prefer JFK to have said: "We choose to send robots to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, because they are easy and cheaper and faster..." It's worth reading the whole speech: https://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/ricetalk.htm https://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/ricetalk.htm It ends with: "Well, space is there, and we're going to climb it, and the moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God's blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embarked." There will as many robots as you want in space, but man will be out there right along with them, no matter how difficult or dangerous or expensive it is.
      - melling 9y ago
        Let me blog it. I get tired of answering this question. The short answer is if we had built robots and sent hundreds into space, we'd have more humans in space now because it would be safer and cheaper. We'd also learn more quickly. We'd also have more advanced robots because of the investment. We reached the moon, spent a few years, then gave up because of cost. Would you rather have a new robotic explorer, or two or three, queued for Mars, Titan, etc every year or a few people on Mars by 2040?
        cevn 9y ago
        Totally agreed. We could have an army of terraforming robots establish a space on Mars, for instance, then send humans there when we're sure it's hospitable. Or send drones throughout the galaxy with human embryos to potential habitable planets. An ethics nightmare, to be sure, but interesting to consider the implications nonetheless.
    - pavel_lishin 9y ago
      > cheaper, faster, and easier We don't know that, right? We don't know how much it would cost to develop the tech; we don't know how long it would take; we don't know how difficult it would be. It might actually be cheaper to send canned apes throughout the solar system, than human minds in robot bodies; we just don't know yet. This is at best a Fermi problem, where we can start throwing numbers out and hope our estimates are within a few orders of magnitude.
      - melling 9y ago
        We send what we have now then iterate. Release early, release often. Funding robotics, AI, etc is not a NASA funded goal but goes under defense budget, tax deductions for industry, etc. The real problem is getting the money for space. No one wants to write a big check for Mars. They’ll write big checks for the Pentagon, automation in manufacturing, and strategic national goals.
        pavel_lishin 9y ago
        I was talking specifically about mind uploads.
- gscott 9y ago
  I am not sure if we want to upload our minds... then the robots would be humping each other endlessly and never get anything done.
indubitable 9y ago
Curiosity cost us about $2 billion and it has some of the most state of the art systems on board. Among these was its drill, which was supposed to provide some of the most important science from the mission. And as my use of past tense probably belies, it broke after 15 activations. [1] Redundancies and the best NASA has on it notwithstanding, it remains broken. They've now, a year later, developed a high risk idea to try to get some drilling done. We'll see how that works out. This would have been something a human on site could have repaired in relatively short order. The point is that robotics and other technologies are advancing extremely rapidly, but they're still not anywhere even remotely close to being able to compare to humans in general purpose functionality - let alone improvisation. Don't forget that those amazing videos of Atlas are the result of countless takes and on-site specialization. This [2] article describes the results of the most recent DARPA Robotics Challenge which featured all the big names, including Atlas. The competition included tasks like walking, opening a door, and climbing up stairs. The most ostensibly difficult would be navigating a specially modified vehicle after having humans carefully place and suspend their robot inside it. And the developers all knew ahead of time exactly what the tasks would be and the circumstance, except for one surprise task which ended up being pulling a lever. The long and short is that it was a disaster. Quoting the article: "If there's a single lesson from the [DARPA Robotics Challenge], it's that humanoid robots are falling robots. Also, that the road to humanoids that aren't so clumsy will be long, and strewn with shattered components. If DARPA doesn't hold another version of the DRC, then the first one will have been little more than a grim status update, and a self-contained failure, for the few of us that realized it happened." The point here is that we are a long ways away from robots that can remotely compare to humans for general purpose tasks. The timeline for getting to the Moon and even to Mars on the other hand is very near future. -- Beyond all this, space exploration is not just about science. Did you know China put a probe on the moon in 2013? Technically it was a rover, but back to those robotics problems - it became a probe. It was the first time anything had soft landed on the moon since 1976. If you did know this you're probably already a huge enthusiast in the field because the world collectively yawned, even though it made some groundbreaking discoveries including discovering the moon's geographic makeup was far different than we thought. That discovery is playing no minor role in driving the recent moon race. But people want to see and discover space themselves. And there are lots of people willing to pay lots of money for the privilege. Two individuals have already purchased a Moon flyby from SpaceX - scheduled for next year. And even though a flyby is nothing compared to a soft landing, that will not be met with a yawn. Action requires money. Money requires public drive. Public drive requires manned operations. [1] - http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2017/0906-curiosity-balky-drill-problem.html http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2017/0906-cu... [2] - https://www.popsci.com/darpa-robotics-challenge-was-bust-why-darpa-needs-try-again https://www.popsci.com/darpa-robotics-challenge-was-bust-why...
pikchurn 9y ago
Robots don't get anywhere near the effectiveness of boots on the ground, even with the most advanced robotic explorers we have today. All of the science done by the Martian rovers could have been done by a human geologist in a few hours work (except the traversal itself, so let's add a day's hike on top of a few hours lab work). And the robots are only really able to inspect the stuff that happens to be exposed on the ground around them and easily reached by limited robotic manipulators. Sending humans to Mars for even a 30-day mission would be orders of magnitude more science return than the entire robotic exploration program to date. And that's without considering relativity time-lag. There's serious consideration of an orbital precursor mission to Mars that would put robotic handlers in Martian orbit, or a free-return trajectory near Mars, without a lander, to do little more than remote control a couple of Curiosity-style rovers that accompany them (and maybe visit one or both low-gravity martian moons). It's anticipated that the time-lag reduction alone could vastly increase the amount of science that could be done on a robotic mission before the nuclear batteries die or servos get clogged with dust. And of course all the robotic arguments are predicated on basic science being the only reason to go in the first place. In reality, most of the people interested in Mars and space exploration generally want people to permanently settle in space. I actually don't give a damn whether there was once life on Mars.. but there damn well better be human societies there within my lifetime.
- melling 9y ago
  "Robots don't get anywhere near the effectiveness of boots on the ground, even with the most advanced robotic explorers we have today" Yes, that's why I said we accelerate the research into robotics. No one wants to fund NASA to go to Mars. It'll cost $200 billion to get a dozen people there, then it'll cost even more to stay. The DoD can spend a few billion in R&D, and that's a small project. We can give tax credits for R&D to private industry. The research doesn't even go on the NASA budget.
  - pikchurn 9y ago
    I think you don't understand the vast chasm between robotic capability and humans, and what can reasonably be done to close that gap. You're talking about making some sort of robotic geologist/biologist in the literal sense -- a humanoid robot or equivalent functionality that is space hardened, resists abrasive dust like nothing we have on Earth, requires no on-site maintenance, and is autonomous enough to operate for 10's of minutes at a time as good as it would be if humans were at the helm and it was next door. I don't think you understand the scale of those requirements. It would be cheaper to send humans, even at absolutely ridiculous Apollo-on-steroid prices.

sushibowl 9y ago

Can you really get to the moon with just $90M? My impression is that SpaceX is just about the cheapest launch provider currently available, and they charge something like $50-60M to get to orbit. And then you need to do all the tech required to land on the lunar surface as well. Do they anticipate getting additional funding or decreasing costs?

melling 9y ago
https://lunar.xprize.org https://lunar.xprize.org
azernik 9y ago
They're the cheapest (probably) per kilogram; but if you're willing to settle for smaller payloads, you can get to orbit for quite a lot cheaper. For example, the European Vega will get you 2.5T to LEO for under $40M. Half your budget on launch costs isn't bad.
- sushibowl 9y ago
  This article has some more details on their plans. Apparently they're looking to launch as a secondary payload on something like a falcon 9: http://spacenews.com/japanese-lunar-exploration-company-ispace-raises-90-million/ http://spacenews.com/japanese-lunar-exploration-company-ispa... I'm not sure if launching as a secondary decreases costs. They do have two missions planned apparently, after which they hope to start generating revenue by carrying up to 30kg of customer payload to the moon per launch.
QAPereo 9y ago
It costs roughly $4000/lb to LEO, and the rocket equation makes the whole thing pretty unforgiving with current tech.
pikchurn 9y ago
I would imagine the initial funding does not include the cost of the rocket. The risk of this effort is not in the trans-lunar stage. Reliable solutions for that can be purchased off the shelf. A seed-stage company needs to prove out the custom tech required for its own application, then if there's a business case what they're doing in the first place they can go raise additional funding at a higher valuation to cover the cost of launch. No reason to suffer many times more dilution on that now.

sleepychu 9y ago

This is just them investing $90M in bitcoin right? To the moon...

philyalater 9y ago

If NASA hasn't made it back to the moon for decades and all it takes is $90M, they are doing something seriously wrong.

dplgk 9y ago

A lot less money than it takes to build a social network.

casualtech 9y ago

Huh. Is Japan company trying to reach to the moon? Haha.

quadrature 9y ago
Hey, take a look at the guidelines for HN. Its preferrable to have comments here that have something to offer to the discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

vkou 9y ago

Is this an Onion piece? Or something from the Beaverton? They want to land on the moon... To set up a billboard? And here I thought that the Silicon Valley model of startups making money by advertising other startups that make money by advertising other startups was insane. Oh... They want to start a space economy. That's great, but there is no mention of what will that space economy do. They will maybe consider mining water, for a potential future human settlement that will... Do what? They will put up a billboard, to advertise... To whom?