New Delhi, Aug. 23 -- National Space Day commemorates India's Chandrayaan-3 landing near the Moon's south pole. But the third edition of the observance arrives at a more commercially significant moment for the country's space programme.

India's space sector is no longer defined only by ISRO missions. It now includes around 440 registered space startups, expanding private investment, regulatory authorisations for non-government entities and a growing pipeline of technology transfers from public research to industry.

The challenge, however, is no longer whether India can create a space-tech ecosystem. It is whether that ecosystem can build commercially viable companies-ones that sell satellite services, launch systems, data products and s...