Washington ? Organizers of a competition to achieve the first privately funded manned spaceflight say 27 teams have entered and they expect to award the $10 million prize by the end of the year.

Many of the teams vying for the “X Prize” already have conducted test launches, with one of the two U.S. teams propelling a suborbital spacecraft to 68,000 feet, or about 13 miles.

The contest calls for launching a manned craft to 62.5 miles above the Earth, which is generally considered the edge of space, twice within two weeks. The craft must be able to carry three people.

Members of the X Prize Foundation said they thought that by 2006 there would be enough of a market to have teams race to space and back to win a proposed X Prize Cup.

“We’re ready to go,” said Diane Murphy, spokeswoman for the X Prize.

The X Foundation, a St. Louis-based group created to promote the development of private, reusable launch vehicles, is supported by donors including Dennis Tito, an American who spent $20 million to fly in a Russian craft as the first space tourist, and Erik Lindbergh, a pilot and grandson of Charles Lindbergh.

The group’s mission is to build what it believes is a $20 billion market for private citizens to travel to space.

“The goal is simple: to establish a new generation of aircraft that will take you and me to space,” Murphy said.

They believe many people will want to pay thousands of dollars to take a 15-minute trip to the edge of space, during which there will be moments of weightlessness.

The two U.S. teams competing for the X Prize are Scaled Composites, which has been conducting tests over a Mojave Desert airport in California, and Armadillo Aerospace of Dallas.