ispace’s Resilience Lander Fails in Second Attempt
June 7, 2025 – Japan’s ambitious quest to establish itself as a leader in commercial lunar exploration has suffered another setback. Tokyo-based company ispace confirmed that its uncrewed Resilience lander crashed during its touchdown attempt on the moon on June 5, 2025, marking the firm’s second consecutive failure in two years16. The mission, which aimed to deploy a rover and conduct scientific experiments, ended in silence as flight controllers lost contact moments before landing.
The failure underscores the immense challenges of private lunar exploration, even as global interest in the moon surges. Despite this setback, ispace remains committed to future missions, including a NASA-backed lunar landing attempt in 2027. This article delves into the details of the failed mission, its implications for Japan’s space ambitions, and what lies ahead for commercial moon exploration.
Japan’s Moon Landing Dream Crashes Again
The Resilience Mission: A Second Crushing Blow for ispace
The Resilience lander, part of ispace’s Hakuto-R Mission 2, was designed to demonstrate the company’s ability to safely deliver payloads to the lunar surface. Launched in January 2025 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, the spacecraft took a slow, fuel-efficient trajectory to the moon, entering lunar orbit in May46. However, during its final descent on June 5, telemetry data indicated a critical malfunction in the laser rangefinder, which measures altitude.
The sensor delays caused the lander to descend too quickly, leading to a hard landing—likely a crash—just 102 seconds before scheduled touchdown57. ispace CEO Takeshi Hakamada apologized to stakeholders, acknowledging the failure but vowing to press forward with future missions. The company’s first lander, Hakuto-R Mission 1, also crashed in 2023 due to a software error misjudging altitude.
Why Moon Landings Remain a Daunting Challenge
Landing on the moon is far more difficult than reaching orbit. Unlike Earth, the moon has no atmosphere to slow spacecraft, meaning landers must rely entirely on thrusters and precision navigation. Even minor sensor malfunctions—like those that doomed Resilience—can lead to catastrophic failures48. Historically, more than half of all lunar landing attempts have ended in failure, a stark reminder of the risks involved.
The private sector’s track record has been mixed. While Firefly Aerospace and Intuitive Machines achieved successful landings earlier this year, others, like Astrobotic’s Peregrine, failed before even reaching the moon. ispace’s struggles highlight the steep learning curve for commercial space firms, which often operate with tighter budgets than government agencies.
Payloads Lost: Scientific and Cultural Experiments Gone
The Resilience lander carried a $16 million payload, including a Luxembourg-built rover named Tenacious, which was supposed to collect lunar soil samples for NASA16. The rover also carried an unusual artistic payload—a miniature Swedish-style red cottage called Moonhouse, created by artist Mikael Genberg. The tiny structure was meant to symbolize future human habitation on the moon.
Other lost experiments included:
- A Taiwanese radiation probe
- A Japanese water-splitting technology demo for producing oxygen and hydrogen
- An algae-growing experiment to test sustainable food sources for lunar bases46
The failure means these projects will have to wait for another mission, delaying potential advancements in lunar resource utilization and long-term moon colonization.
Financial and Strategic Fallout for ispace
The crash sent ispace’s stock plummeting by 29%, reflecting investor concerns over repeated failures1. However, CFO Jumpei Nozaki assured that the company is not in immediate financial distress, citing continued investor support18. Unlike SpaceX, which survived early rocket failures before dominating the launch market, ispace lacks the same financial cushion.
The company’s next mission, Apex 1.0, is already in development for a 2027 launch under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program. This larger lander will carry more advanced instruments, but another failure could jeopardize ispace’s role in the Artemis program and push Japanese firms toward foreign lunar transport providers16.
Japan’s Broader Lunar Ambitions Amid Setbacks
Despite ispace’s struggles, Japan’s government remains committed to lunar exploration. The country made history in 2024 when its SLIM lander achieved a precision touchdown, making Japan the fifth nation to soft-land on the moon14. The government has also partnered with NASA to send Japanese astronauts to the moon under the Artemis program.
However, ispace’s repeated failures may force a reevaluation of Japan’s reliance on private-sector lunar logistics. Some experts suggest that Japanese companies may now look to U.S. or European landers to test their moon-bound technologies.
What’s Next for Commercial Moon Landings?
The global lunar race is far from over. Blue Origin and Astrobotic are planning moon missions later this year, while China and India continue expanding their government-led programs38. For ispace, the focus now shifts to diagnosing the Resilience failure and ensuring Apex 1.0 avoids similar pitfalls.
CEO Hakamada compared ispace’s journey to SpaceX’s early struggles, emphasizing perseverance: “We have to continue our mission to have moon exploration by the Japanese.”8 Whether ispace can recover and finally succeed in 2027 remains one of the biggest questions in the new space race.
Conclusion: A Stepping Stone, Not the End
While the Resilience crash is a major setback, it is not the end of Japan’s lunar ambitions. The lessons from this failure will shape future missions, and ispace’s determination mirrors the resilience its lander was named after. As the world watches, the next chapter in private moon exploration will hinge on overcoming these challenges—one hard landing at a time.
For now, the moon remains an elusive target, but the dream of a sustainable lunar economy is still within reach.
