L&T Eyes Role In NASA's Successor To The International Space Station

After powering ISRO's space missions for more than five decades, India's largest engineering firm Larsen and Toubro has now set its eyes on the international market, particularly the next International Space Station.

L&T was earlier in talks with Jeff Bezo's Blue Origin for supplying orbital launch capabilities and space habitat solutions but the negotiations ran into some difficulties.

"Some remnants of that discussion continue till today but now with NASA. So, we are also hopeful that when the US requires its next space station, Indian firms will have a role to play in the supply chain," Vikas Khita, Vice President, L&T Precision Engineering and Systems, told PTI.

Khita, who was speaking on the sidelines of an industry meet organised by Geospatial World, said the firm was also interested in building space ports, space parks and manufacturing clusters, areas which are expected to get a boost considering the government's opening up of the space sector for private participation in 2020.

"In commercial terms, we are looking at a fivefold increase in turnover by 2033 of the space economy and a large part of this increase is to come from the upstream and the downstream sectors," he said.

L&T has been involved in the production of a range of hardware for every project of ISRO, including the Chandrayaan, Gaganyaan, and Mars Orbiter missions.

The Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd-L&T consortium is also producing five Polar Satellite Launch Vehicles, marking the industry's maiden foray in building rockets for the space agency.

The engineering firm is also learnt to have evinced interest in the Small Satellite Launch Vehicle, as ISRO is all set to transfer technology of the newly developed rocket to the private industry.

India is set to play a significant role in the future space economy, aiming to capture about eight per cent of the global market by 2033. The global space industry is projected to be worth around USD 1.8 trillion by 2035.

India's space economy is also expected to grow from its current value of around $8.4 billion to $44 billion by 2033.