A draft RFP issued to six bidders for EO project

The Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe) has shortlisted six out of nine bidders to build and manage a space-based earth observation (EO) system.

The selected entities include consortiums of SatSure, Pixxel, Dhruva Space and PierSight; Ananth Technologies, Solar Group and XDLINX; and Bharat Electronics Ltd and Sisir Radar.

Further, Tata Advanced Systems Ltd and Centum have also been shortlisted.

IN-SPACe has issued a draft request for proposal (RFP) to the selected applicants for the INR 1,500 Cr constellation of earth observation satellites project.

The final date to send in their financial bids as mentioned in the draft RFP is March 31.

IN-SPACe invited bids from Indian startups and companies in July last year to design, build and launch a constellation of satellites that will be equipped with advanced imaging technologies.

In December 2024, it was reported that IN-SPACe received bids from 30 entities to build the earth observation system.

To note, each consortium is limited to include only four members to jointly apply for the tender, where the government will reportedly offer a grant of up to INR 350 Cr to the winning consortium to build the system.

Further, the clutch of winning bidders will have to repay this grant amount over the operational period of the constellation.

This development comes weeks after IN-SPACe rolled out the Technology Adoption Fund (TAF) worth INR 500 Cr to financially support the nation’s space technology startups to refine their technologies, enhance production processes, and meet market demands both within India and abroad.

Notably, the Centre has taken a number of steps to promote private players in the space sector. In October last year, the Union Cabinet approved setting up a VC fund with a corpus of INR 1,000 Cr to boost the country’s space economy.

The VC fund would be operational in the first quarter of FY26.

The Centre’s measures have resulted in the emergence of a number of new spacetech startups in the last few years. As a result India’s space economy is poised for transformative growth in 2025 and is eyeing a market size of $44 Bn by 2030. Inc42