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Two satellites by Indian startups — SpaceKidz India and Pixxel (incorporated as Sygyzy) — were tested at the UR Rao Satellite Centre of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in Bengaluru. This comes after India opened up its space sector to private players in June last year.
This is a first for the Indian space agency, which so far has only taken help in manufacturing and fabrication of various parts of satellites and rockets from the Indian industry. ISRO helped these two companies fix problems with the solar panels on their respective satellites.
Confirming the development, ISRO Spokesperson Vivek Singh said that the two firms have finished the testing already. In the coming months, these two firms will also test their engines at Sriharikota spaceport and Thiruvananthapuram rocket centre.
"There have been several firms that have worked with ISRO in the past, but these firms are into manufacturing satellites. They are almost through with their development. In our next PSLV launch, they could be our co-passengers," he said.
Earlier ISRO had only provided launch facilities to private firms at a cost. In June 2020, ISRO Chairman K Sivan had announced that the agency will open its labs, testing facilities and quality facilities to private companies so they don’t have to invest in infrastructure. An independent body, Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe), was set to oversee the space activity of the private sector, and also to handhold and share facilities of ISRO. The decision of the body would be binding on ISRO as well.
Eight months after this announcement, ISRO is ready to launch commercial satellites in a PSLV mission later this month. It will be the first mission wherein satellites by the Indian industry will be commercially launched by ISRO.
In January 2019, ISRO had launched world's lightest satellite, KalamSat V2, designed by students from SpaceKidz India as an experiment using the fourth stage of the PSLV.
The PSLV C-51 mission will carry a Brazilian satellite Amazonia-1 under a commercial arrangement made by the NewSpace India limited, the commercial arm of Isro. In addition, the launch vehicle will carry 20 passenger satellites — including one nanosatellite by ISRO, the two satellites under testing, and UnitySats (developed by a consortium of academies).
Another startup, Skyroot is working towards developing a launch vehicle which is likely to be launched by the end of the year. ISRO will share their spaceports, the existing one at Sriharikota and the upcoming one in Thoothukudi, with industries for such missions.
Source: news18.com, hindustantimes.com
Written by Siddhant Sharma
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