Rather than launching a standalone mission, Germany's DLR and France's CNES collaborated with Japan's JAXA on the asteroid explorer Hayabusa2 by providing the scientific lander MASCOT. This shoebox-sized Mobile Asteroid Surface Scout was jointly developed by DLR and CNES and was carried as a payload on Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft. In October 2018, MASCOT was deployed onto asteroid Ryugu, equipped with four instruments (including a French spectrometer) to study the surface. This collaboration allowed Germany and France to make scientific and technological contributions to a major exploration mission in a cost-effective manner by supplying a payload.

Prerequisites:

• Institutional & political interest and support for human spaceflight 

• Partnerships with space agency or commercial provider with access to space exploration mission

• Existence of technological capabilities and infrastructure in national ecosystem (space agency, industry or academia) to develop payload

• Lead agency & budget

• Procurement pathway

• Partner support as needed

Cost:

Small payloads such as CubeSats, ISS experiments, hosted sensors

• Ballpark: USD 0.5M–5M

• Includes: payload/experiment design and development, safety and integration reviews, procurement of launch opportunity via partner mission, data downlink and storage, researcher training and exchanges, data analysis and publication

Larger payloads such as lander/rover instruments, advanced experiments

• Ballpark: USD 5M–50M

• Includes: co-development of instruments with partner agencies or primes, environmental testing and qualification, integration with host spacecraft, launch and operations participation, scientific exploitation and outreach

Timeframe:

Small payloads

• Overall 24–48 mo

• Phase: partnership agreement & payload definition (6–12 mo), design & development (12–18 mo), integration & launch (6–12 mo), operations & data analysis (6–12 mo)

Larger payloads

• Overall 48–96 mo

• Phase: partnership & scoping (12–18 mo), design & development (18–36 mo), integration & launch (12–24 mo), operations & data exploitation (12–24 mo)

Pros:

• Affordable - Collaboration provides a low-cost entry point into space exploration.

• Reputation Increase - Collaboration builds international credibility and technical trust.

Considerations:

• Technical Complexity - Payloads must comply with stringent technical specifications to be accepted for integration into a foreign spacecraft

• Articulation - International collaboration requires intensive diplomatic and technical coordination.

• Timeline - Collaborations are susceptible to schedule delays of the host mission.