how I start a private space company
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As obvious from other answers, starting a “ SpaceX” will require huge amount of money. But that is not all. Starting a Space company in
I was going through this and wanted to give my 2 cents in the discussion.
As obvious from other answers, starting a “SpaceX” will require huge amount of money. But that is not all. Starting a Space company in India has its own challenges. Apart from the money issues, here are the things I believe hinder the way to an Indian SpaceX
Space policy - There is no space policy as such. Space operations are to be governed by government (ISRO), and government only. Even getting a permit for explosives (yes, rocket fuel counts as explosive) is a huge headache. There are talks of a new bill being brought out by current government to make things more industrialized. Fingers crossed !
Government help - A space company in India is practically impossible without government support (and so was SpaceX). ISRO was made ground up with the help of government, investing in each sector required for space missions since 1970s. Government assistance towards hardware startups isn’t quite similar to what we see VCs for software startups. Although, it appears that government wants to “Make in India”, it isn’t that easy. E.g. Startup India funds are released towards a startup only if a VC is willing to invest equal amount on his part. And that scheme is already seeing its failure in few cases.
You don’t wanna mess with Zohan …. uh I mean … ISRO - If you are starting a space company in India, you need ISRO. Period. If you create any rocket or satellite that competes directly or indirectly with ISRO’s missions, well … good luck with that. And since ISRO creates a large variety of rockets and satellites, you really need to find your niche. Essentially, you need to be assisting ISRO if you need to grow this company, just like SpaceX did. They provided NASA a launch vehicle to reach ISS from, and further that could launch NASA’s astronauts.
If you research enough, you will find that there are companies like Bellatrix Aerospace already working with ISRO.
Industry maturity - ISRO has faced a lotttttt of trouble finding, and even raising, suitable industry vendors who can fabricate parts of rockets and/or satellites, for last 4 decades. Even today, no ISRO rocket or satellite is made independent of ISRO. Compare this with USA, where NASA has never been the one manufacturing rockets. They had always, and they do still, hired vendors to create rockets for them, and launch under NASA’s guidance and regulations. Hence, the industry maturity for Space grade manufacturing is quite high in USA, compared to India.
Although, this has seen a recent development when ISRO officially launched NewSpace India Limited - NSIL. It is targeted towards scaling up industry participation in Indian space programs. They say PSLV will be manufactured and launched independent of ISRO. Again, fingers crossed !
Suitable talent - As insulting as it may sound, this is true to a large extent. India does not have space grade talent in excess. Yes, we have ISRO, yes, Indian origin people work at NASA and SpaceX. But the kind of talent coming out from colleges in recent years, is not suitable to start a new space company.
I am not trying to belittle ISRO or any new ISRO employee. Rather, my point is - ISRO’s success has a huge part of the founders and forefathers who built the system, processes, regulations, the core technology and uplifted the industry to become capable of what we are today. If one wants to create a SpaceX today, he/she would need that level of a core team. The level of Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam, Dr. Satish Dhawan, Dr. Nambi Narayanan and many others. And from my experience, our colleges are not producing those in excess. Whatever is produced, is duly exported to USA.
From an entrepreneur’s perspective, if you want to start a Space company (contact me? :D ) , you need to find the niche where you can work with or for ISRO. E.g. are creating carbon fiber 3D printers, which can eventually print rocket structures. There are already few promising candidates coming up in rocket space like Bellatrix and Skyroot. Team Indus was sort of a black swan in its time, but it couldn’t complete what it aimed, but they’re still around.
Above all, if you want to start a space company, you should be ready to “Eat glass and stare into abyss”. As fancy or funky it may sound, it’s not fun.