Five, four, three, two, one, zero.
In 2019, millions of Indias watched on
as their nation launched its most ambitious
lunar mission to date.
Over $80 million had been spent
and the nation's pride was on display and on the line.
Narendra Modi, India's Prime Minister
watched from mission control as the lunar lander
made its final heart-stopping descent.
Then communication was lost.
The lander had crashed into the lunar surface.
The encouragement and solidarity
of Prime Minister Modi.
Despite the failure, this mission signaled
a new direction for India's space agency, the ISRO.
Through the 90's it had created arguably
the world's most cost effective space program.
With NASA, it was about pushing the boundaries
of innovation, sending hardware to areas in the solar system
or in the universe that weren't sent before.
Within India, it was about setting up infrastructure
that could support the country.
Over the last decade India has ripped up
it's old rule book and launched missions
to Mars and the Moon.
The early ambition of helping its people is now extending
to leading the world.
Our current prime minister, Mr. Modi,
he does see space as a strategic sector.
Historically, India has not competed
with the mega budget and ambitions
of the great space faring nations, but that's changed.
India now wants to take its next giant leap into space.
India's space story stands apart
from the space pioneering nations.
In July 1980, over two decades after Sputnik,
India launched its Rohini satellite.
Making them the newest member of an exclusive club.
But the Indian Space Research Organization
was trying to do things differently.
Unlike NASA or the Soviet space program
which aimed to explore space for grand, national
and scientific ambitions, the ISRO was tasked
with creating an indigenous space programme
solely to allow India to access
the practical advantages of space.
India has always maintained that India wants space science
to be developed for betterment of its people.
If you look at it for telecommunications, for electronics,
India has used space technology for all of that.
I would say the first 20 odd years,
the focus was on technology independence.
How do you build your own satellites,
your own earth stations?
How do you launch your own satellites,
which means you have to build rockets?
By 1994, India had its own liquid stages rocket
the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle or PSLV.
Early 2000s to late 2010s is when PSLV started becoming
the workhorse for the world.
People could come here to be able to launch their satellites
for a much more cost-effective manner
and without compromising on quality.
That changing of building hardware only for the country
to then providing these services globally,
I think started the beginning of the century
and PSLV was a very critical cog in that.
From 1994 to 2017,
the rocket launched 48 Indian satellites
and 209 satellites from customers abroad.
The ISRO had carved out its own place in the space sector.
It was the reliable and cost efficient way
to put a satellite into orbit.
Launch costs are measured by how much you pay
to get one kilogram into orbit.
In the mid 90's, India's PSLV rocket was the cheapest way
to get hardware into space.
It cost around $8,500 per kilogram.
That compares to NASA's Atlas II rocket which cost
around $18,700 per kilogram.
Fast forward to now and SpaceX will get you into low orbit
for a fraction of that cost.
ISRO has already acknowledged that the technologies
that are being developed by Elon Musk could be a threat
to their business.
India's competition is rising.
There are billionaires entering into the field.
For India to maintain the dominant position,
the country needs to step up further.
And that step up for India could be
its new Small Satellite Launch Vehicle.
It will have a payload of 500 kg
and deliver multiple satellites in one mission.
But this new rocket may not be enough.
The ISRO is also developing a reusable rocket like SpaceX's
but the timeline on that is less clear.
In the meantime, India has signaled its intent
to fundamentally reset its space program.
We focused on technology independence.
Which was essential for the last several decades.
Now we need to look outwards and look far.
Susmita Mohanty has over two decades experience
in the space industry and co-founded
India's first private space start-up, Earth2Orbit in 2009.
She now runs a space thinktank.
We were sort of at the crossroads
and India started thinking what next?
We can build our own stuff.
We can launch our own satellites.
We use our satellites for a variety of applications.
So I think planetary exploration was sort
of the natural next step if you ask me.
Susmita's thinktank, Spaceport Sarabhai,
aims to help private companies engage with the ISRO
as well as promote India's space technology.
We would like to give India an international voice,
especially when it comes to space law and policy,
as it relates to the space environment,
space resource mining, in orbit repair
and the kind of lower economy that's starting to emerge.
We would also like to provide guidance to the government
on policy matters,
using solid research and stakeholder feedback.
India's shift from practical space program
to exploration hinges on the belief that private companies
and private money will take over.
India just doesn't have the budget
to spend on these things.
And private investment can really come in handy.
The current government has always maintained
that there's no reason for a government to be in business.
And when you look at space as a business,
like we have seen in the U.S. or in Europe,
the moment you look at space as a business
and not just as a strategic asset,
that's when you encourage private companies
to pump in more money.
It's not really new for private companies
to invest in Indian space technology.
Some of the private suppliers have already supplied to ISRO,
but now the government is opening up.
We are seeing private satellite players,
private launch players.
So that's something new and fresh,
which is being welcomed by every party.
One of those new players is Pixxel.
Based in Bangalore since 2019,
they make satellite hardware and software.
We fit in the new mould of companies
that are operating independently without having
to depend on government support, but work hand in hand
to make sure that whatever heritage that the country has had
can now be taken to global stages as well.
We're building a constellation
of the world's first hyperspectral imaging satellites
that will provide a much more detailed view of our planet
than has been possible.
The constellation will be global and it will provide data
on a daily basis as well.
On the software side of things, we take this data
and we build the tools that will enable extraction
of insights such as in prediction, soil, health,
how's the pollution happening?
Pixxel is part of a new crop of startups
vying for ISRO contracts.
Historically, it's been very difficult for smaller companies
to win big state deals.
But that's changing.
ISRO has done all that is needed in terms
of indigenous capability.
Now it's the responsibility of the private sector
to take those up, whether it's communication
Earth observation, GPS and whatnot, and build on top of that.
That leaves space agencies to do cutting edge work
that only governments are willing to spend,
a private company can never spend billions of dollars
on something that is only for purely research
and scientific perspective.
This shift in Indian space policy
is been driven by Prime Minster Modi himself.
He has encouraged India's space ambitions
to be a source of national pride.
He does see space as a strategic sector,
both from an economy point of view and a geopolitical tool.
He wants the country to sort of progress
towards a $5 trillion economy.
So space can play a very big role,
both in terms of products and services.
As a politician, he knows how space can strategically help
when it comes to war deterrence.
Space can play a role there and also a role in diplomacy.
So I think he uses both facets of space.
But while the government is drumming up support
critics point out the contradiction that upwards
of 360 million Indians live in poverty.
India is a developing country that runs a fiscal deficit,
that runs a budget deficit.
So the amount of money you put into the space budget
is going to be always under scrutiny
for a country that doesn't have enough toilets
for its own people.
Do you really want to spend money on space technology?
And the government does have a tough time at times
to convince people why space technology is needed.
But at the same time, there are some big advocates for it.
I don't think it's an either or situation
it's that if we spend on space doesn't mean
you're not spending anything on making other things better.
I'll just take an example.
Schools in India are spread apart.
Some of them don't have connectivity to fiber optics.
They don't have connectivity to any kind of internet.
When India launched its indigenous communication satellite,
a lot of these schools were able to come online
and be connected with what the other regions
of the country were doing just from the fact that
there were a few communications satellites
that were sent up that enable that connectivity.
Because getting the other infrastructure
from a wide perspective was simply not possible.
India's spending needs
to be put in perspective.
The U.S. remains the undisputed big spender,
accounting for 58% of the world's space budget,
with $47.7 billion spent in 2020.
China, which has significantly increased its spending,
takes second with $8.9 billion.
In 2020, India spent just over $2 billion.
What the ISRO and India's space sector is most proud of
is what they have achieved with so little.
If you look at the budget for India's space missions
to the moon and to Mars, you realize that they actually cost
a fraction of what it costs
to make a Hollywood movie on space.
India's first Mars mission,
cost less than the film "The Martian".
India got it's satellite to the red planet for $74 million.
$20 million dollar less than the budget for the film.
Then when you compare their mission to other nations,
the contrast is even starker.
NASA's Mars satellite, Maven, cost $651 million,
that's more than eight times the cost of the Indian mission.
But being frugal may not be sustainable or desirable.
I think budget constraints can be a good thing,
but it can also be a limiting factor.
So if you have budget constraints, it invariably
helps you do things using methods of frugal engineering,
but that's not always good when you look at the market
and the economy.
In the sense, if I want to go and compete internationally,
I'm a company in Bangalore.
I would want the kind of capital
that a company in California has
to be able to compete internationally.
So I think we should not stop at frugal engineering.
India is looking at space, not just as a strategic asset,
but also as sort of a source of future profitability.
If you look at the likes of what Elon Musk are doing,
they're trying to colonize other planets and any country,
any company, any individual that does it first,
will have a big first mover advantage.
I think in order to make space exploration
in the coming half century be more humanistic and inclusive
geographically speaking, racially, ethnically,
is going to be a huge challenge because a lot of the money
rests in a certain part of the world,
it would end up being an expedition of sorts
where you would only have the wealthy participate,
leaving behind a large section of the earth,
it's not going to look very pretty.
In 1990, Asia nations represented
only 9% of global space spending, now it's 19% and rising.
India is determined to be a leader not a follower
in the new space race.