Global firms show interest in Indian space, Musk-owned SpaceX seeks licence

As India is preparing to launch 5G services in every city of the country, global companies are showing interest in the businesses related to the country's space.

Elon Musk-owned SpaceX has applied to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for a global mobile personal communication by satellite services (GMPCS) licence to launch broadband-from-space services in India under its Starlink brand.

SpaceX has applied for the licence, now the government will decide on the licence following the due procedure laid by the department, an official privy to the details told ANI.

Official said that the global companies are now showing interest in Indian space, SpaceX is among one of them. Bharti Group-backed OneWeb and Reliance Jio Infocomm's satellite arm have already secured licence, SpaceX is the third company to apply for the licence.

SpaceX is the world's leading provider of launch services and to be the first private company to have delivered astronauts to and from the International Space Station (ISS). It is the only company to complete all civilian crew missions to orbit.

SpaceX provides internet connectivity globally with Starlink constellation. Official said that after getting the licence, SpaceX needs to get approval from the Department of Space and after that get spectrum allocated for offering services.

SpaceX will also need to establish an in-country earth station and deploy its global satellite bandwidth capacity in India. These clearances will have to come from the Indian National Space Promotion & Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe), a central regulatory body mandated to attract private capital in the space sector.

After the global companies showed interest in Indian space, competition is intensifying in India's relatively nascent broadband-from-space services segment, which could be worth USD 13 billion by 2025, with Jio, OneWeb, Nelco of the Tata Group, Canada's Telesat, and Amazon, too, exploring the launch of satellite broadband services in India.

( With inputs from ANI )

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