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| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DARPA Grand Challenge | 4/4 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_Grand_Challenge | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T12:46:15.106307+00:00 | kb-cron |
In early 2020, three teams were expected to compete by rapidly launching a small satellite payload into orbit, with minimal notification, from two different launch sites (this requirement was later, when there was only one competitor left in the Challenge, relaxed so that the launches should use different launch pads, but could use the same launch site) – one just days after the other – for an opportunity to win prizes. The prizes of the Challenge are: All teams that qualify for the competition would receive $400,000. Each team to successfully carry out an orbital launch gets a prize of $2 million, and is eligible to try to make a second launch in rapid succession. The second launches of the teams are scored (based on combination of time to launch, mass launched and orbital accuracy, etc.); the winning team gets $10 million, second prize is $9 million, and third prize $8 million. The pool of launch sites for the Challenge originally consisted of 8 launch locations; in the end, only Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska was used for an attempted launch. The Challenge was announced on 18 April 2018, and on 10 April 2019, three finalist teams who would be attempting to launch rockets were announced: Virgin Orbit, Vector Launch and Astra (although at the time it was not published that the third finalist was Astra; the company was referred only as a "stealth startup"). In the autumn of 2019, both Vector and Virgin dropped out of the competition, Vector because of financial problems and Virgin because it wanted to focus on other customers than DARPA. The final remaining team, Astra, attempted to launch their Astra Rocket 3.0 for the Challenge from Pacific Spaceport Complex – Alaska in late February and early March 2020, but several launch attempts were all called off due to weather and technical difficulties. With the only team left in the competition failing to launch their rocket in the time frame set by DARPA, the Challenge was called off 2 March 2020 with no winner of the DARPA Launch Challenge. The $12 million prize pool went unclaimed. No rocket launch was performed by any contender of the DARPA Launch Challenge.
== Technology == A technology paper and source code for the computer vision machine learning component of the 2005 Stanford entry has been published. 2007 Urban Challenge teams employed a variety of different software and hardware combinations for interpreting sensor data, planning, and execution. Some examples:
== See also ==
== References ==
== External links ==
Official website Announcement of the 2007 Grand Challenge (PDF) DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge
=== Press coverage ===
Forbes article on the DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge competition Engadget article on the DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge competition