Nodal space body Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Centre (IN-SPACe) yesterday said that it has selected three homegrown startups to build indigenous small satellite bus platforms.
In an official announcement, IN-SPACe said that Astrome Technologies, Azista Industries and Dhruva Space were selected from a pool of 15 applicants after a rigorous and multi-stage evaluation process. The body signed a contract agreement with all three selected companies on February 11.
The startups will now receive a grant of ₹5 Cr each to develop and demonstrate a robust, modular and scalable small satellite bus.
“…. By enabling indigenous satellite bus platforms and integrating them with India’s emerging small satellite launch capabilities, we are laying the foundation for India to become a preferred global destination for end-to-end small satellite manufacturing, launch, and hosted payload services,” said IN-SPACe chairman Pawan Goenka.
Chiming in, IN-SPACe’s technical director Rajeev Jyoti said that the proposed satellite bus platforms will reduce entry barriers for payload developers and strengthen domestic manufacturing capabilities.
Part of the IN-SPACe’s Satellite Bus as a Service (SBaaS) initiative, the project aims to build a cost-effective platform to accommodate multiple hosted payloads that caters to both domestic and global requirements.
A small satellite bus platform is the part of a small satellite (typically less than 500 kg) that provides essential subsystems, including power, communication, thermal control, and navigation, necessary for a payload to function in orbit.
The selection comes nearly a year after the nodal space body invited proposals from local startups and enterprises to build the satellite bus in April 2025. As per the announcement of opportunity (AO), IN-SPACe will disburse milestone-linked grants to the selected players.
In addition, the space agency will also facilitate access to the infrastructure, testing facilities, and technical expertise of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and space department for the selected companies.
In the later phases of the project, IN-SPACe also plans to undertake operational missions to enable hosted payload missions on these satellite bus platforms.
The selection of three startups is the latest in the series of steps taken by the government body to foster private sector capabilities in the space tech sector. In August last year, IN-SPACe selected a consortium of four homegrown startups, comprising Pixxel, PierSight Space, SatSure Analytics and Dhruva Space, to design, build and operate India’s first fully indigenous commercial Earth Observation (EO) satellite system.
On top of this, the Centre also operationalised the ₹1,600 Cr Antariksh Venture Capital Fund (AVCF), which marked its first close at ₹1,005 Cr in November. The fund will likely back around 35 space tech ventures, with average cheque sizes in the range of ₹30 Cr to ₹40 Cr.
Earlier this month, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman also allocated ₹13,705.6 Cr under the “space technology” bucket in the Budget 2026-27.
The regulatory push comes as the homegrown space tech ecosystem had a breakout funding year in 2025. As per Inc42 data, funding in the sector surged 94% to $157 Mn from $81 Mn in 2024.
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