The European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) have announced a strengthened partnership encompassing various space endeavors. JAXA President Hiroshi Yamakawa and ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher formalized this expanded cooperation on November 20th in Tsukuba, Japan.
Their joint statement outlines new collaborations in several key areas: planetary defense, Earth observation, activities in low Earth orbit following the International Space Station (ISS) era, space science, and Mars exploration. Both agencies committed to enhancing their partnership and striving for impactful future missions.
A key element of the expanded cooperation is accelerating the study of potential collaboration for ESA’s Rapid Apophis Mission for Space Safety (RAMSES), focused on the asteroid Apophis's close approach in 2029. While requiring approval at the next ESA ministerial meeting in late 2025, preliminary work is underway.
JAXA and ESA are also exploring joint small lander missions to Mars in the 2030s, leveraging expertise in electric propulsion and entry, descent, and landing technologies. Post-ISS low Earth orbit activities are also a focus, aiming to achieve scientific, societal, and economic goals.
Lunar exploration is another key area of collaboration. This includes joint analogue testing and synergistic robotic missions, aligning with commitments to Gateway and Artemis. JAXA engineers may utilize ESA’s new lunar analog facility. Interoperability of lunar communication and navigation capabilities will also be a focus, building upon ESA’s Moonlight program.
In space science, the collaboration continues for the ESA-led Athena mission, and for the M-MATISSE and Plasma Observatory medium-class mission candidates. Continued dialogue on ESA’s large missions focusing on the moons of giant planets and JAXA’s LiteBIRD mission is also planned.
The statement acknowledged decades of successful cooperation, including joint missions like BepiColombo and EarthCARE. The new collaboration, termed “Next Big Cooperations,” aims to drive societal progress, scientific innovation, and sustainable space exploration, addressing global challenges such as climate change and planetary defense.
ispace, a Japanese lunar exploration company with a European presence, welcomed the announcement. “As a global company leading lunar development with entities in Japan and Europe, we sincerely welcome the recent announcement by the ESA and JAXA,” said Takeshi Hakamada, ispace founder and CEO. “We have had the privilege of working with both space agencies on significant exploration efforts and welcome the acknowledgement of commercial opportunities ‘with the aim of contributing to new scientific discovery as well as human exploration on the lunar surface,” Hakamada added.
Koichi Suzuki, JAXA's deputy director for safety and mission assurance, highlighted recent achievements including the SLIM moon landing and the Astroscale ADRAS-J mission. Future plans for Japan include the LUPEX lunar landing with ISRO, a crewed pressurized rover for Artemis, and large debris removal from orbit.