PSLV booster launches on C-42 mission. (Credit: ISRO)
December 19, 2018 – Washington, DC — NanoRacks is excited to announce that the Company has signed its first customer contract for a small satellite rideshare on the India Space Research Organization’s (ISRO) Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV). Spire, a long-time customer of NanoRacks, has signed to fly four of their Lemur 3U CubeSats, targeting a March 2019 flight.
BENGALURU, India (ISRO PR) — The Sixth edition of the Bengaluru Space Expo (BSX-2018) took off with the theme — Creating dynamism in the Indian space ecosystem — with specific focus on enabling new space players in India. This event provided a single platform for the interaction of hundreds of delegates with specialists, entrepreneurs and space industry heavyweights.
The event is organised by Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) in association with Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Antrix Corporation Limited. More than 700 delegates are participating in this Asia’s largest event on Space, Satellites and Launch Vehicles.
Inaugurating the event, Dr K Sivan, Chairman, ISRO and Secretary, Department of Space, called upon the industry to take active part in all ongoing and future space missions.
Lunar rover (Credit: TeamIndus)
It appears highly likely that the decade-old Google Lunar X Prize will end on March 31 without a winner following reports out of India that Team Indus has pulled out of the race. The Ken reports that
The launch contract that TeamIndus signed with Antrix Corporation—the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro)—in December 2016, in pursuit of its $30-million Google Lunar XPRIZE goal, has been cancelled. Multiple sources within Isro confirmed the news….
Conservatively speaking, the price tag for the PSLV chartered launch alone is said to be upwards of $20 million; the cost of building and testing the moon rover is several million more. It’s learnt TeamIndus couldn’t pony up funds to pay Antrix beyond the initial signing amount. “Isro has cancelled the contract for a lack of compliances and payment issues,” says a person who is close to these developments. He says, “Rahul [Narayan, co-founder TeamIndus] has spoken to all on the floor recently and informed all of Isro’s decision of pulling out of the mission”. TeamIndus did not respond to questions sent by email. Without denying the news, a spokesperson for the company said, “As a company, we’d not comment on this”.
There are some potential snags for Team Indus and Team HAKUTO in their efforts to win the Google Lunar X Prize. Team Indus and a Japanese team, Hakuto, are contracted to fly on ISRO’s PSLV XL rocket on December 28, 2017, three days before the closure of the deadline for the Google X Prize contest. The two teams will share the nearly $30 million commercial cost for the launch. “The […]
India’s launch services are attracting more customers: Antrix, the commercial arm of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), is planning to send into orbit 68 small satellites from countries across the world early next year. “These 68 small satellites will be riding on our workhorse Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) in the next six months,” said S Rakesh, chairman and managing director of Antrix, while announcing the 5th edition of Bengaluru […]
PSLV rocket lifts off with India’s Mars Orbiter Mission. (Credit: ISRO)
Space News reports on disagreements within the U.S. government about whether to allow American companies to launch satellites aboard Indian rockets.
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) endorsed an advisory committee’s recommendation that commercial U.S. satellites continue to be barred from using the PSLV.
The Annual Compendium of Commercial Space Transportation: 2016
Executive Summary
The size of the global space industry, which combines satellite services and ground equipment, government space budgets, and global navigation satellite services (GNSS) equipment, is estimated to be about $324 billion. At $95 billion in revenues, or about 29 percent, satellite television represents the largest segment of activity. Following this is government space budgets at $76 billion, or 24 percent, and services enabled by GNSS represent, about $76 billion in revenues. Commercial satellite remote sensing companies generated on $1.6 billion in revenues, but the value added services enabled by these companies is believed to be magnitudes larger. Because remote sensing value added services includes imagery and data analytics from other sources beyond space-based platforms, only the satellite remote sensing component is included in the global space industry total.
Credit: PlanetiQ
BOULDER, Colo., Dec. 3, 2015 (PlanetiQ PR) — PlanetiQ has signed a contract with Antrix Corporation Limited, the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), for the launch of PlanetiQ’s first two weather satellites on a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) during the fourth quarter of 2016. Ten more satellites are planned for launch in 2017 to complete an initial set of 12 satellites that will dramatically improve global weather forecasting, climate monitoring and space weather prediction, and enable advanced analytics for numerous industries worldwide.
India’s space agency is looking to hand off more duties to the private sector: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is planning to magnify the role of its industry partners by starting joint ventures with them and readying them to do entire tasks like satellite launches, its Chairman AS Kiran Kumar has said. The agency has sounded out its commercial arm, Antrix Corporation, to explore such opportunities for specific projects. […]
G. Madhavan Nair
After exhausting all its bad options, ISRO is actually going to do the right thing:
Dr. K. Radhakrishnan, Chairman, ISRO and Secretary, Department of Space stated that the Department is in the process of getting necessary clearances for releasing the Reports of the two Committees viz. (a) the High Powered Review Committee set up by Government on February 10, 2011 (with Shri B.K. Chaturvedi and Prof. Roddam Narasimha as Members), and (b) the High Level Team set up by Government on May 31, 2011 (chaired by Shri Pratyush Sinha) to examine various aspects of the ANTRIX-DEVAS Agreement of January 2005.
Finally.
