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The Ansari X PRIZE was a Space Competition in which the X PRIZE Foundation offered a US$ 10,000,000 Prize for the first Non-government Organization to launch a reusable Manned Spacecraft into Space twice within two weeks. It was modeled after early 20th-century Aviation prizes, and aimed to spur development of low-cost spaceflight. The prize was won on October 4 2004 , the 47th anniversary of the Sputnik 1 launch, by the Tier One project designed by Burt Rutan and financed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, using the experimental Spaceplane SpaceShipOne . $10 million was awarded to the winner, but more than $100 million was invested in new technologies in pursuit of the prize.

The second X PRIZE, the ''' Archon X PRIZE ','' was announced in October 2006 by the X PRIZE Foundation. The prize is $10 million for the first non-governmental organization to sequence the complete genomes of 100 humans in 10 days time. More information on the X PRIZE in genomics at: Genomics X PRIZE


MOTIVATION

The X PRIZE was first proposed by Dr. Peter Diamandis in an address to the NSS International Space Development Conference in 1995. The competition goal was adopted from the SpaceCub project, demonstration of a private vehicle capable of flying a pilot to the edge of space, defined as 100 km altitude. This goal was selected to help encourage the space industry in the Private Sector , which is why the entries were not allowed to have any government funding. It aimed to demonstrate that Spaceflight can be affordable and accessible to corporations and civilians, opening the door to Commercial Spaceflight and Space Tourism . It is also hoped that competition will breed Innovation , introducing new low-cost methods of reaching Earth Orbit , and ultimately pioneering low-cost Space Travel and unfettered Human Expansion into the Solar System .

The X PRIZE was modeled after many prizes from the early 20th Century that helped prod the development of Air Flight , including most notably the $25,000 Orteig Prize that spurred Charles Lindbergh to make his solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean . NASA is developing a similar prize program called Centennial Challenges to generate innovative solutions to Space Technology problems.

Created in May 1996 and initially called just "X PRIZE", it was renamed "Ansari X PRIZE" on May 6 , 2004 following a multi-million dollar Donation from Entrepreneur s Anousheh Ansari and Amir Ansari .


CONTESTANTS


Twenty-six teams from around the world participated, ranging from volunteer hobbyists to large corporate-backed operations:

This contestant list notably did not include traditional space access companies like Boeing and Lockheed , which many in the industry believe to be incapable of replacing their present Space Transport ation vehicles with low-cost alternatives. These critics claim as evidence the companies' several failed attempts to do so, such as the X-33 project, on contract from NASA and other U.S. government agencies. However, the X PRIZE Foundation itself did not ban these companies from applying, so long as they could prove their efforts on this project would be free of government funding.


COMPETITION STATUS

and Paul Allen of Mojave Aerospace Ventures on November 6 , 2004 . The Ansari X PRIZE trophy is on the left.]]
The , Scaled Composites , and Mojave Aerospace Ventures .)

The trophy is currently on display in the lobby of the Science Fiction Museum in Seattle, Washington .


FLIGHT ATTEMPTS BY TEAMS THAT DID NOT WIN

Although only the Tier One team actually launched a spacecraft into suborbital space, several other teams have conducted low-altitude tests or announced future plans to launch into space:
  • The Da Vinci Project originally announced that their First Flight would be on October 2 2004 , but this was postponed indefinitely on September 23 2004 , as they were unable to obtain a few necessary components in time. They have not announced a revised timetable.

  • The Canadian Arrow team conducted a successful full-power engine test in 2005 and announced on June 2 , 2005 , that it had received permission from the Canadian government to use Cape Rich as a future launch site.

  • On August 8 2004 , Space Transport Corporation's Rubicon 1 and Armadillo Aerospace 's test vehicle, in two separate unmanned test launches, both crashed and were destroyed.

  • On February 15 2005 , AERA Corporation (Formerly American Astronautics) announced its plans to send seven paying passengers into space as early as 2006, a full year before the first Virgin Galactic flight.



LIST OF MAJOR DONORS BY ORDER OF DONATION



ORGANIZATION


With the Ansari X PRIZE, the X PRIZE Foundation (based in Santa Monica, CA) established a philanthropic model in which offering a prize for achieving a specific goal stimulates entrepreneurial investment that produces a 10 times or greater return on the prize purse and at least 100 times in follow-on investment and social benefit. The Foundation has developed into a non-profit prize institute that conceives, designs and manages public competitions for the benefit of humanity.


SPINOFFS


The success of the X PRIZE competition has spurred spinoffs that are set up in the same way. There have been two major spinoffs at this point, the first of which is the ", focused on Hydrogen Vehicle research, although this goal has already been addressed by H.R. 5143 , an X-Prize-inspired bill passed by the House of Representatives.


SEE ALSO






EXTERNAL LINKS




FURTHER READING

# "The X PRIZE", an article by Ian Parker on pages 52 – 63 of the 4 October 2004 issue of '' The New Yorker ''