Planetary Transportation Systems (PTS), formerly known as PTScientists and Part-Time Scientists, is a Berlin-based aerospace company. They developed the robotic lunar lander "ALINA" and seek to land on the Moon with it. They became the first German team to officially enter the Google Lunar X-Prize competition on June 24, 2009,^[1] but failed to reach the finals in 2017 for lack of a launch contract.^[2] During the summer of 2019, the company filed for bankruptcy, and the ALINA project was put on hold. In July 2021, PTS was selected with ArianeGroup to build ESA's ASTRIS kick-stage.^[3]

PTScientists GmbH is the company representing the team competing at the Google Lunar X-Prize. The company opened offices in Berlin-Mahlsdorf in 2015. It sells payload for the Moon mission to individuals, organizations and companies. The cost for one kilogram of payload is between €700,000 and €800,000.^[4] Furthermore, the know-how of the team is available as a consulting service.^[5] As of April 2018, the European Space Agency was studying six private companies, including PTScientists, to work on potential ISRU payload delivery to the Moon surface by 2025.^[6]

An additional source of income are merchandising products for the Moon mission.^[7][8] PTScientists lists several partners and sponsors in their web site.^[9]

The PTScientists team formed in June 2009 as "Part-Time Scientists", when ten teams had already entered Google Lunar X-Prize (GLXP), which had started in 2007. Later the company PTScientists GmbH (Limited) was founded.

On August 22–23, 2009, the PTScientists presented their project at the Open Doors Day of the Federal Ministry for Education and Research.^{[citation needed]}

On December 28, 2009, the team presented their mission at the 26th annual Chaos Communication Congress. In a two-hour presentation, the team provided a detailed overview of all parts of the project. This was the first time the European-made private lunar rover prototype had been presented to the public.^[10][11]

Early 2015 the team won awards in the categories Mobility and Vision, and a total of $750,000 in the Milestone Prizes of GLXP.^[12]

During the Advertising Festival in Cannes, on June 23, 2015, Audi was announced as a main sponsor and the rover developer.^[13][14] As a result of this cooperation, the two identical rovers were named Audi Lunar Quattro during the 2016 North American International Auto Show in Detroit.^[15]

In March 2017, the group announced that they planned to perform the world's first private Moon landing^[18] with a mission they now simply call "Mission to the Moon". A landing module called Autonomous Landing and Navigation Module (ALINA) would launch in 2021^[17] on an Ariane 64 rocket^[17] to the surface of the Moon.

The ALINA lander would deploy two lunar rovers, but none of the three spacecraft are designed to endure the long lunar night.^[16] The three spacecraft are technology demonstrators to showcase the lander's capabilities, including landing near the desired landing zone, roving, and real-time communication.

By late 2016, PTScientists had secured agreements to deliver payloads from the U.S., Canada and Sweden,^[19] but only one payload (from NASA Ames) has been disclosed.

In January 2019, ESA contractor Ariane Group announced that it has received a one-year contract from ESA to study a lunar lander concept to mine lunar regolith to extract natural resources. PTScientists were awarded a subcontract and are responsible for the payload delivery portion of the study. The mission would be launched on an Ariane 64 in 2025.^[2]