AROSE is thrilled to be a participant in the Trailblazer Stage 1 tender, issued on behalf of the Australian Space Agency (ASA), as part of a $150 million initiative designed to support Australian businesses, and researchers, join NASA’s inspirational endeavour to return to the Moon and then go on to Mars.
As a result of this project, Australian organisations will join with NASA, and other international partners, to bring Australian capabilities to space, the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
AROSE is all about space and our participation in this tender has reinforced our relentless focus on the space industry. It also gave us the opportunity to think about and plan for how we would inspire the nation about our existing and growing space capabilities. Trailblazer represents a huge opportunity to harness Australia’s pedigree in remote operations innovation, particularly in the resources sector, and our members are really excited about how we will apply learnings from Trailblazer and other space projects on earth.
For AROSE and our Consortium partners, it was a privilege to participate in the tender and demonstrate our deep expertise to deliver the Rover mission. We are committed to ensuring that Australian businesses and researchers have access to international space supply chains; that we create jobs in Australia; and support the growth of industries across the economy through the development and application of space technologies.
Our philosophy is Australia first, so the team is a formidable combination of Australian-based companies, led by the Trailblazer Team of AROSE members First Mode, Fugro, and Nova Systems. The AROSE Trailblazer Team has not only demonstrated experience in delivering space missions but also has a history of successful innovations in terrestrial industry sectors such as resources, defence, and subsea.
The AROSE Trailblazer response came hard on the heels of the organisation’s receipt of a funding boost from the Federal Government’s Moon to Mars Initiative Demonstrator Grant in June last year. The AROSE consortium used the funding to develop a pilot concept for a remotely operated service rover to provide foundational services to establish landing and instrumentation sites on the lunar surface and support lunar infrastructure activities.
The AROSE Trailblazer proposal is directly leveraging knowledge amassed through the AROSE Lunar Service Rover Demonstrator Feasibility Study. The Study is in its final stages and AROSE Consortium members are undertaking the trade analyses to understand Australia’s existing space capabilities that can be leveraged for the development of a Lunar Rover.
We also believe a primary advantage of the AROSE Trailblazer Consortium is our ability to leverage our collective experience in accelerating the development and translation of capabilities across multiple industries, ensuring a sustainable technology application path and so sustainable commercial pipeline.
AROSE appreciates the significance of the Trailblazer program and considers it an honour to be able to lead industry advances for the future of a sovereign space industry in the global market.
No matter who is ultimately successful, Australia should be enormously proud of NASA’s nod to the standout remote operations expertise we have in this country. We are certainly very excited to be in the running to play a part of a mission that will bring all of Australia closer to the moon.
