Context: The Japanese space startup Ispace Inc has launched its own private lander M1 to the Moon under its HAKUTO-R mission from the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

HAKUTO-R Mission

• HAKUTO-R is Japan’s first-ever lunar mission and the first of its kind by a private company.

• The name HAKUTO-R refers to the white rabbit that Japanese folklore suggests lives on the Moon.

The M1 lander will deploy two robotic rovers: 

1. A two-wheeled, baseball-sized device from Japan’s JAXA space agency and 

2. The four-wheeled Rashid explorer made by the United Arab Emirates.

• The M1 lander is expected to soft land at Atlas Crater which is located on the south-eastern edge of the moon’s Mare Frigoris (“Sea of Cold”).

About Rashid

• Rashid is UAE’s first moon rover and the Arab world’s first lunar mission. It will be landed on the moon through the HAKUTO-R mission.

• The rover will study the properties of the lunar soil, the petrography and geology of the Moon, dust movement, surface plasma conditions, and the Moon’s photoelectron sheath.

Key significance of the HAKUTO-R mission

• First, it would allow Japan and the UAE to join the United States, Russia and China as the only nations that have successfully landed a craft on the lunar surface.

• Second, it would mark the first all-private Moon landing with everything from launch to the landing conducted with privately built vehicles.