India, Aug. 24 -- Space has, even before Star Trek made the phrase popular, always been the final frontier. Exploring the unknown has come to mark not just a country's scientific ambitions, but also become a measure of its industrial capabilities, something that marks its technological, economic, and geopolitical dominance. The US and Russia engaged in an intense competition over space in the 1960s, and it can be argued that the former's victory in it - with the moon landing - heralded its arrival as a technology leader, something that holds true even today.

India, an impressive contender in space-tech, thanks to ISRO's remarkable strides, now faces the challenge of building on its competence in delivering high-value space-tech on much s...