Billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX company will launch a fully paid satellite to the moon next year with the cryptocurrency Dogecoin, Canadian company Geometric Energy Corporation, which will lead the lunar mission, announced on Sunday (May 9th).
The satellite, dubbed DOGE-1, will be launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket in the first quarter of 2022, the Calgary-based company said in a statement Sunday.
The satellite, cubic in shape and weighing 40 kilos, will aim to obtain
"lunar spatial information using on-board sensors and cameras,
" she said.
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The
“DOGE-1 Mission to the Moon”
will be
“the very first commercial lunar payload in history paid entirely with Dogecoin,”
Geometric Energy Corporation said, without specifying the transaction amount.
"We are delighted to launch DOGE-1 on the Moon!"
, said Tom Ochinero, vice president of commercial sales for SpaceX.
"The mission will demonstrate the application of cryptocurrencies beyond Earth's orbit and lay the foundation for interplanetary trade."
The announcement comes in the wake of Elon Musk's stint on the American satirical comedy show SNL (Saturday Night Live) in which the whimsical boss of Tesla and SpaceX praised the Dogecoin, which was originally created as a joke, which he helped legitimize in his tweets. A big believer in cryptocurrencies, Elon Musk described in a sketch on Saturday evening Dogecoin as
"an unstoppable financial vehicle that will conquer the world"
adding, enthusiastically,
"Forward to the Moon!"