It beamed back photos of Earth along the way before entering lunar orbit on March 21.
The 7-foot lander carried a mini lunar rover for the United Arab Emirates and a toylike robot from Japan designed to roll around in the moon dust, along with items from private customers.
Takeshi Hakamada, the founder and CEO of ispace, said a second mission is already in the works for next year. “We will keep going, never quit lunar quest,” he added.
Founded in 2010, ispace hopes to start turning a profit as a one-way taxi service to the moon for other businesses and organizations. Two lunar landers built by private companies in the U.S. are scheduled to liftoff later this year. NASA is participating in the launches.
Meanwhile, the exact fate of Hakuto-R still remains uncertain. And engineers at ispace seek to establish contact or find evidence to confirm it crashed.
It is possible that the spacecraft landed but suffered a malfunction or worst case there was a system failure, and the vehicle crashed on the lunar surface.
