Readying India’s first private rocket, with eye on building ‘cabs’ for space
- Swati Bharadwaj
- TNN Mar 06, 2026, 16:17 IST IST
As he’s talking up future plans for one of India’s pioneering space startups, Pawan Kumar Chandana, the co-founder of Skyroot Aerospace, employs an analogy that’s unexpectedly, and literally, grounded. “Think of SpaceX as a transcontinental train or an A380. We’re aiming to become the cab or business jet that drops you at a specific slot in a unique orbit in space with our smaller rockets,” he says.
It’s a reference intended to pinpoint where the company sees itself in the vastness, and vast potential, of space operations. The baby steps have been taken with the sub-orbital rocket, Vikram-S, which Skyroot launched successfully in Nov 2022 on its very first attempt, a feat that even Elon Musk’s SpaceX could not achieve. That distinction burnishes credentials for a company looking for a foothold in the space game even as Chandana’s clear that it’s not aiming at competition with the space giants.
It’s a reference intended to pinpoint where the company sees itself in the vastness, and vast potential, of space operations. The baby steps have been taken with the sub-orbital rocket, Vikram-S, which Skyroot launched successfully in Nov 2022 on its very first attempt, a feat that even Elon Musk’s SpaceX could not achieve. That distinction burnishes credentials for a company looking for a foothold in the space game even as Chandana’s clear that it’s not aiming at competition with the space giants.
