ISRO changes focus
March 17, 2021
By Chris Forrester
India’s Space Research organisation (ISRO) has declared it will now focus on research and development. The move means ISRO will offload most of its space-related activities.
ISRO chairman Kailasavadivoo Sivan says that the decision will open up the company and the sector to more privately-funded participation in the space sector.
“The future of space activities is now changing. Earlier all the space activities were done by only ISRO. Now, we are giving equal opportunity to private players to also do it”, he said.
Sivan added ISRO can share its technologies with private players and is giving them opportunity to utilise its facilities.
“We want to hand-hold them to bring them to our (ISRO’s) level so that most of activities that ISRO is doing can be offloaded to industry and we can spend more time on advanced research to take India to the next level (in the space sector), he commented.
India is setting up an autonomous body, the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe).