ESA DG Says NASA Confirms Commitment to ExoMars Rover

ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher announced today that NASA has confirmed it will help get the ExoMars Rosalind Franklin rover to Mars. Developed in partnership with Roscosmos, ESA terminated all its activities with Russia after the invasion of Ukraine in early 2022 and turned to NASA to provide critical components to achieve the rover’s mission. ESA’s 23 Member States are meeting in Germany right now to decide on ESA’s programs and budget for the next three years, including the rover’s future.

Speaking at the Council of Ministers 2025 (CM25) meeting this morning, Aschbacher said “just yesterday” he received “very good news from NASA to confirm their contribution to the Rosalind Franklin mission.”  Deep cuts to NASA’s science budget proposed by the Trump Administration raised concerns about whether the agency could fulfill its pledge.

The rover is named Rosalind Franklin in honor of the British chemist whose work in X-ray crystallography led to the discovery of DNA. Airbus Defence and Space in Stevenage, U.K., was the prime contractor. It will be the first Mars rover with a drill capable of penetrating 2 meters (6.6 feet) into the surface to search for signs of ancient life. The rover also has a ground penetrating radar that can see 3 meters (9.8 feet) underground. It also carries the Mars Organic Molecular Analyzer (MOMA) developed by NASA in partnership with the French and German space agencies.

It’s part of ESA’s Exobiology on Mars — ExoMars — project that includes an earlier spacecraft, ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), that’s been orbiting Mars since 2016. TGO carried an experimental European lander, Schiaparelli, but it crashed.

The ExoMars project has had a tumultuous history, starting as a U.S.-ESA joint mission, transitioning to an ESA-Russia mission after the U.S. withdrew almost all of its support during the Obama Administration for budgetary reasons, and back to an ESA-U.S. mission after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The rover was to be delivered to the Martian surface by Russia’s Kazachok lander, both launched on a Russian Proton rocket. In February 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine, the rover and lander were fully integrated at Thales Alenia Space in Turin, Italy and about to be shipped to Russia’s Baikonur Cosmodrome for a September 2022 launch.

ESA ended all cooperation with Russia in the wake of the invasion. The rover and lander were de-integrated and ESA turned to NASA for help with critical components it couldn’t supply itself including radioisotope heating units (RHUs) required to keep it warm.

In 2022, NASA began working with ESA and the arrangement was formalized in May 2024 with NASA agreeing to provide the RHUs, elements of the propulsion system needed for landing, and launch on a U.S. commercial provider.

NASA did not confirm to SpacePolicyOnline.com by press time that they gave ESA any assurances yesterday. We will update this article if/when we hear back.