Indian space startup Agnikul Cosmos has announced its most ambitious mission yet, Mission-02, which aims to achieve India's first recovery of an orbital-class rocket booster, marking a major step toward reusable launch vehicles and low-cost access to space.
The announcement comes just days after China successfully recovered a reusable rocket booster, highlighting the growing global race to develop reusable launch systems.
Read Full StoryCompanies such as SpaceX, Blue Origin and Rocket Lab are all investing heavily in reusable rockets, which have dramatically lowered the cost of reaching orbit.
The approach could enable spent upper stages to perform additional tasks such as hosting experiments, testing technologies or supporting future space infrastructure.
"One-time-use rockets were originally developed when reaching space was about accomplishing one-off goals," said Srinath Ravichandran, Co-founder and CEO of Agnikul Cosmos.
Indian space startup Agnikul Cosmos has announced its most ambitious mission yet, Mission-02, which aims to achieve India's first recovery of an orbital-class rocket booster, marking a major step toward reusable launch vehicles and low-cost access to space.
The announcement comes just days after China successfully recovered a reusable rocket booster, highlighting the growing global race to develop reusable launch systems.
Read Full Story
Companies such as SpaceX, Blue Origin and Rocket Lab are all investing heavily in reusable rockets, which have dramatically lowered the cost of reaching orbit.
SpaceX has led the revolution with its Falcon 9 rocket, flying recovered boosters more than 650 times, with some individual boosters completing 35 missions. The ability to reuse rockets has fundamentally changed launch economics, allowing missions to be conducted more frequently and at significantly lower costs.
Agnikul now hopes to bring that capability to India.
Beyond booster recovery, Mission-02 will also attempt to transform the rocket's upper stage into a functional in-orbit platform, instead of allowing it to burn up in the atmosphere as space debris after completing its mission.
The approach could enable spent upper stages to perform additional tasks such as hosting experiments, testing technologies or supporting future space infrastructure.
"One-time-use rockets were originally developed when reaching space was about accomplishing one-off goals," said Srinath Ravichandran, Co-founder and CEO of Agnikul Cosmos.
"For economically viable, frequently flyable missions, the philosophy is about rapid reuse, complete flexibility and modularity. This is what our Mission-02 will demonstrate," he said.
Agnikul earlier announced that former ISRO Chairman S. Somanath has joined the company's board as an Observer.
During his tenure at ISRO, Somanath oversaw major programmes including LVM3, Chandrayaan-3, Aditya-L1 and critical Gaganyaan test missions, giving him extensive experience in launch vehicle design and advanced space technologies.
"To have Dr. Somanath guide us on strategy and execution at the Board level is a true blessing," Ravichandran said.
The announcement comes at a time when India's private space sector is gaining momentum. With Skyroot Aerospace preparing the maiden orbital flight of Vikram-1 and Agnikul now targeting reusable launch technology, private companies are increasingly taking the lead in areas that will define the future of global space transportation.
If successful, Mission-02 would place Agnikul among a select group of companies worldwide attempting reusable orbital rocket technology, while bringing India a step closer to developing launch systems capable of supporting future commercial missions, space stations and lunar exploration at substantially lower costs.
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