MILAN - Italian luxury group Prada and Texas-based startup Axiom Space will collaborate to design NASA's lunar spacesuits for the Artemis III mission planned for 2025, the two companies said on Wednesday.

Prada's engineers will work alongside the Axiom Space systems team throughout the design process, developing solutions for materials and design features to protect astronauts against the challenge of space and the lunar environment, they said in a joint statement.

Axiom has a contract with U.S. space agency NASA to develop spacesuits for use on the moon and other space programmes.

(Reporting by Elisa Anzolin)