The world’s most cost-effective space agency, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is making an all-out effort to retain India’s position as a low-cost yet most reliable satellite launch services provider. And it aims to maintain this leadership position in the arena through the Small Satellite Launch Vehicle (SSLV) and a reusable rocket.
“At one [point in] time, we had about a 2 per cent share of the international commercial space launch market. But then [Elon] Musk introduced his reusable Falcon 9 rocket, bringing down the cost of a commercial space launch significantly. India is no longer the cheapest in the market,” said partner at the New Delhi-based law firm Dua Associates, Ranjana Kaul.
Therefore, as the orbit economy booms, the cost of satellite launches continues to decline and competition promises to get ever more cutthroat the world’s sixth-largest space agency needs to ensure the country stays in the reckoning.
The SSLV was conceived on the back of increased demand for launch vehicles with a quick turnaround time to put small satellite constellations in the Lower Earth Orbit (LEO). It is an all-solid fuel-powered three-stage vehicle capable of launching mini, micro or nano class satellites in the 10-500 kg range.
“The SSLV was created as an industry-friendly rocket and we would like to transfer this rocket to the industry at the earliest. The industry will be given the whole technology to build and operate
it to support small satellite constellations at manageable costs,” ISRO chairperson Sreedhara Panicker Somanath told Business Today in an earlier interview.
Following a process initiated by the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Centre (IN-SPACe), the single window nodal agency for authorising, promoting and regulating private players in the space sector, a total of 20 companies have expressed their interest in the SSLV programme.
“[This] will be a very big deal for the private sector because things that ISRO has developed over multiple years after spending hundreds of crores of rupees will become available to the private sector to take forward. So that will be a big enabler,” declared chairperson IN-SPACe, Dr. Pawan Goenka.
Reusable rocket programme
ISRO has also sought the private sector’s support in expediting its reusable rocket programme to compete with SpaceX. Somanath has already committed ISRO’s support in working with the private sector in designing the complex technology that will go into building it.
“The rocket has to be owned and operated by business houses to not only handle more payloads commercially but also be able to increase its numbers whenever required. This vehicle needs to be realised in the shortest possible time because time is running out,” cautioned Dr. Somanath.
Dr. Somnath’s sense of urgency can be gauged from the successes that SpaceX has had with the Falcon 9 rocket in terms of bringing down the cost of launching payloads in LEO to as low as $2,700 per kg. And a successful deployment of its under-development Starship will see this crashing further to as low as $10 per kg.
Meanwhile, the global satellite communication market is growing steadily at a CAGR of 9.4 per cent and is predicted to be worth $192.09 billion by 2032 vs. $78.22 billion in 2022, according to a study released by the global market research and competitive intelligence provider Fact.MR. Against the backdrop of such bullish projections, India is looking at growing its share in global satellite launches by fivefold within the next ten years.
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Also Read: Global satellite communications market to register runaway growth over next 10 years, says study