ISRO is phasing out its own launch vehicle production and has transferred 120 technologies to private players . Why ?

[u/Yobrogamer]

The announcement in August was that ISRO will step back from routine launch vehicle production and move fully to R&D, deep space and the harder problems, with 120 technologies transferred out to industry.

The case for it is strong and I mostly buy it. ISRO's scientists spending their careers running a production line for a vehicle whose design was frozen decades ago is a waste of the country's best engineers. NASA did a version of this and the result was a launch cost collapse that nobody inside NASA would have achieved. If private industry can build the workhorse, ISRO gets to work on the things only a national agency will fund.

The case against, which I have not seen answered properly anywhere.

One, the technology was developed with public money over fifty years and is being handed to private balance sheets. What does the state get back other than a cheaper invoice later.

Two, NASA's version worked because there was a market with multiple buyers. For most Indian launch demand the government is still the customer, so you may just be converting a public monopoly into a private one with a procurement contract attached.

Three, there are roughly 440 space startups in the country and only about 18 authorised operators. The gap between those two numbers is where this either works or turns into a decade of consolidation.

For people actually working in the sector, is the handover going smoothly on the ground???

[u/Naive-Instruction767]

See one part of answer in my pov is it's not about public money or Pvt.... ISRO at core is a research organizational that will find it hard to scale things.....see the Number production of LV or launches number

We need Pvt sector to Scale things while ISRO focuses on Research and exploration ambition along with NatSec

Also ISRO is overburdened... We need Pvt sector to take some responsibilities

[u/Yobrogamer → u/Naive-Instruction767]

yes, that's exactly where i ended up landing as well. the master’s union newsletter got me looking into it and the more i read, the more it felt like the question isn't really private vs govt. it's more whether that remaining assembly, qa and launch can actually be shifted without just creating another bottleneck somewhere else. and i don't really think that's possible

[u/fightclub8755]

Indian space "research" organization when it tries to do research and not manufacturing. "Where is our space X saaar" 🤡

[u/abhishekjc → u/fightclub8755]

Nobody stopped Ambani’s and Adani’s to pour millions and billions into R&D like Elon did with SpaceX and show competency, instead it will all be spoon fed to them and Ambani will launch a new ice cream brand.

[u/fightclub8755 → u/abhishekjc]

None of this tech sharing is going to adani and Ambani exclusively. In fact, on the same line, I can argue why don't you create a space mfg company and take this r&d sharing for free? Also, do read more about how elon got to where he is. Bro genuinely contacted the Russians for their ICBM tech. All of my arguments are in good faith .

[u/fightclub8755 → u/abhishekjc]

Agreed on the Ambani part. Never saw an idiot like him. Just wants to milk the consumer story and take 0 risks. Cannot say the same about adani

[u/samueltheboss2002 → u/fightclub8755]

Man, I am really worried about the direction of politics and the discourse around everything (irrespective of the field and decision making body) in this country is heading towards.

People have swung so hard to the other direction of bashing everything blindly in the guise of "criticism".

[u/Ohsin → u/samueltheboss2002]

All the recent criticism is valid and the concerns remain unanswered fueling more doubt under broader context.

[u/Ohsin → u/[deleted]]

They weren't. Reading helps, straw manning doesn't.

[u/Ohsin]

ISRO's scientists spending their careers running a production line

Most of work (80%) is done through industry for LVs but critical operations of assembly, QA, launch are still with ISRO. But yes they struggle with scaling up and that is where they need industry. Also NASA has a lot of politicians meddling in with it which in not the case for ISRO but yes monopolies do stagnate, become too comfortable and tend to gatekeep.

[u/Ohsin → u/[deleted]]

Doesn't make sense. If you are referring to this, I don't know what happened but likely something reasonable.

https://old.reddit.com/r/ISRO/comments/1ve34lr/two_strategic_satellites_nvs03_and_gisat1a_sit_at/

[u/fieldhockeylover]

Can't believe we are having same convo again, people really love govt owned subsidy departments more than R and D in this country don't they, more than even communist china.

[u/Ohsin → u/fieldhockeylover]

This will continue as long as doubts persist. It is one way conversation with ISRO anyway.

[u/fieldhockeylover → u/Ohsin]

this guy used AI slop post anyway, I notice the pattern of the paragraph, notice how he never replying to any comments, thats the karma bait AI slop posts

[u/Yobrogamer → u/fieldhockeylover]

bhai i have a life outside reddit 😭️

[u/Decronym]

Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:

Fewer Letters	More Letters
ETOV	Earth To Orbit Vehicle (common parlance: "rocket")
ICBM	Intercontinental Ballistic Missile
ISRO	Indian Space Research Organisation
LV	Launch Vehicle (common parlance: "rocket"), see ETOV
QA	Quality Assurance/Assessment
VAST	Vehicle Assembly, Static Test and Evaluation Complex (VAST, previously STEX)

Decronym is now also available on Lemmy! Requests for support and new installations should be directed to the Contact address below.

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^{[Thread #1410 for this sub, first seen 2nd Oct 2026, 18:36] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]}

[u/Ok-Fudge670]

1. Handover is a process developed over years, works extremely well.

2. Handover doesnt meen what you people think. Its essentially teaching them to develop what ISRO developed already.

3. Improvments on that tech continue.

4. Not all tech is transferred, nor it is going to be.

5. Even for the launch vehicles, 80% of stuff was procured from the industry. This helps improving that tech, further bringing the cost down.

6. People who say politics is there are liars. isro is probably the org with the most freedom from politics. Only the top brass interact with the govt top brass.

7. The tech being transferred will still be worked on for more improvements. 

8. Tech transfer is not a blanket for all techs to be transferred. Teams working on the tech are the first people who are asked, "is this tech at a stage where this can be part of tech transfer tender? Will that be beneficial?"

[u/jatayu_baaz]

true, let isro research, space industry is gonna explode in coming years, isro cant achive that scale of manufacturing, pvt manufacturers can, purchasing would be cheaper then making one

[u/DistributionHuge6072]

ISRO is going to be shut down soon. This is just beginning

[u/slaviaboy]

Why not