IN-SPACe role will be to promote industry and give it opportunity to grow, says Chairman Pawan Goenka

The Prime Minister has launched the Indian Space Association (ISpA), saying it will act as a single-window and independent agency on all matters related to space technology.

The space association will be headed by Jayant Patil, Senior Executive VP for Defence at L&T-NxT. Bharti Airtel's Chief Regulatory Officer Rahul Vatts will be Vice Chairman. Its founding members include Larson & Toubro, Nelco (Tata Group), OneWeb, Bharti Airtel, Mapmyindia, Walchandnagar Industries and Ananth Technology Limited. Other core members include Godrej, Hughes India, Azista-BST Aerospace Private Limited, BEL, Centum Electronics and Maxar India,

Last year, India had opened its doors to private participation in space under the IN-SPACe programme. The reform was aimed at opening up new avenues for private players in not just space exploration but in building satellites, sub-assemblies and other electronic and communications technology.

Currently, the global space economy is pegged at $360 billion and India's share stands at just 2-3 percent. CNBC-TV18’s Shereen Bhan spoke to Pawan Goenka, Chairman of IN-SPACe.

Goenka said, “I am very new to the space industry… just about one month old and learning a lot about it. What I can say is that as I learn more, I find that this is a very exciting industry. There are lots of opportunities for the future. There is so much energy, both in the young and not so young, who are part of the industry. There is tremendous capability that India has built over the years through ISRO, and other government labs and centres.”

On the role of IN-SPACe he said, “I will be chairing IN-SPACe. It is a sort of regulatory authority and the primary task is to ensure that private enterprise is able to participate in the space sector without too much burden of regulatory environment, without slowing it down in the process. It is to kind of enable private enterprise to access what has been developed by ISRO.”

He added, “ISpA, or the Indian Space Association, is similar to CII. So ISpA is the voice of private enterprise that will be coming to the government, to the regulator. And IN-SPACe, which is what I will be chairing, is part of the government as a regulator. You could probably compare that to TRAI. But I would like to point out that the role also includes promoting the industry, which is really the exciting part …in a sense the industry has so much opportunity to grow from $7 billion to $35- 40 billion in four to five years.”

He added, “IN-SPACe will facilitate launching of policies. Policies are normally not set by the regulator, but by the department. And the regulator will work closely with the policymakers to ensure that the policy meets the requirements of the industry. There are about 8-10 policies that are currently in the draft phase. Two of these policies are most important for the industry … the communication and remote sensing policies. These two policies are in advanced stages of getting finalised and released. In my role, I will try and see how the policies can be expedited in terms of launch but the regulator does not release the policies.”

Also Read: PM Narendra Modi launches Indian Space Association, calls it single contact point for space technology