by Srinivas Laxman

India’s PSLV rocket

Credit: ISRO

In February, the workhorse of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), the four-stage Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, or PSLV, launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota. It was a mission for India’s history books, representing a new chapter in the country’s 58-year-old space program.

The mission launched satellites from three private groups: SKI-Satish Dhawan Satellite of Chennaibased Space Kidz India, the Annand satellite of tech startup Pixxel, and the Unity Sat consisting of three satellites designed by students. Notably, the flight marks the opening of the Indian space sector to private entities and start-ups that could replace the traditional and bureaucratic methodologies of the national space program with what has come to be known as “the SpaceX culture”—a younger, faster, and more energetic set of processes.

Also aboard was a remote sensing satellite called Amazonia-1 from Brazil, an ISRO satellite, and 15 more satellites from New Space India Limited, a new organization under the Indian Department of Space.