Antrix Corporation Limited (

ISO 15919 ISO 15919 is an international standard for the romanization of Indic scripts. Published in 2001, it is part of a series of romanization standards by the International Organization for Standardization. Overview Relation to other systems ...

: ) is an Indian

state-owned State ownership, also called public ownership or government ownership, is the ownership of an industry, asset, property, or enterprise by the national government of a country or state, or a public body representing a community, as opposed to ...

aerospace company, headquartered in

Bangalore Bengaluru, also known as Bangalore (List of renamed places in India#Karnataka, its official name until 1 November 2014), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the southern States and union territories of India, Indian state of Kar ...

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

, under the administrative control of the

Department of Space The Department of Space (DoS) is an Indian government department responsible for administration of the Indian space programme. It manages several agencies and institutes related to space exploration and space technologies. The Indian space pr ...

. It was incorporated in September 1992, as a commercial and marketing arm of the

Indian Space Research Organisation The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO ) is India's national List of government space agencies, space agency, headquartered in Bengaluru, Karnataka. It serves as the principal research and development arm of the Department of Space (DoS), ...

(ISRO) by prompting, commercially delivering and marketing products and services emanating from ISRO. It provides major technical consultancy services and transfers technologies to industry.

History

Antrix Corporation was incorporated on 28 September 1992 as a

private limited company A private limited company is any type of business entity in Privately held company, "private" ownership used in many jurisdictions, in contrast to a Public company, publicly listed company, with some differences from country to country. Example ...

owned by the Indian government. Its objective is to promote the ISRO's products, services and technologies. The company is a

Public Sector Undertaking Public Sector Undertakings (PSU) in India are State-owned enterprise, government-owned entities in which at least 51% of stake is under the ownership of the Government of India or State governments of India, state governments. These types of f ...

(PSU), wholly owned by the

Government of India The Government of India (ISO 15919, ISO: Bhārata Sarakāra, legally the Union Government or Union of India or the Central Government) is the national authority of the Republic of India, located in South Asia, consisting of States and union t ...

. It is administered by the

(DoS). It had dealings with

EADS Astrium Astrium was a European aerospace company and subsidiary of the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS), headquartered in Paris. It designed, developed and manufactured civil and military space systems and provided related services ...

Intelsat Intelsat S.A. (formerly Intel-Sat, Intelsat) is a Luxembourgish-American multinational satellite services provider with corporate headquarters in Luxembourg and administrative headquarters in Tysons, Virginia, United States. Originally formed ...

, Avanti Group, WorldSpace,

Inmarsat Inmarsat is a British communications satellite, satellite telecommunications company, offering global mobile services. It provides telephone and data services to users worldwide, via portable or mobile terminals which communicate with groun ...

, SES World Skies,

Measat MEASAT Satellite Systems Sdn. Bhd. (formerly Binariang Satellite Systems Sdn. Bhd.) is a Malaysian communications satellite operator that owns and operates the MEASAT (Malaysia East Asia Satellite) and AFRICASAT spacecraft. The company provides s ...

Singtel Singapore Telecommunications Limited, trading as Singtel, is a Singaporean telecommunications conglomerate, the country's principal fixed-line operator and one of the four major mobile network operators operating in the country. Overview T ...

and other space institutions in Europe, Middle East and South East Asia. It was awarded ' Miniratna Category-I' status by the government in 2008.

Achievements

*Successful launch of W2M satellite for

Eutelsat Eutelsat S.A. is a French satellite operator. Providing coverage over the entire European continent, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and the Americas, it has been the world's third-largest satellite operator in terms of revenues. Its subsidiary E ...

. * Successful supply of reliable satellite systems and sub-systems. Some of ''Antrixs better known customers are Hughes, Matra Marconi, World Space etc. * Successful Commercial Satellite Launches of SPOT 687 (France), Pathfinder & Dove (U.S),

Tecsar TecSAR-1, also known as TechSAR, Polaris and Ofeq-8, is an Israeli reconnaissance satellite, equipped with a synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) developed by Elta Systems. It was successfully launched at 03:45 UTC on 21 January 2008, by PSLV ...

(Israel) Kitsat (

Korea Korea is a peninsular region in East Asia consisting of the Korean Peninsula, Jeju Island, and smaller islands. Since the end of World War II in 1945, it has been politically Division of Korea, divided at or near the 38th parallel north, 3 ...

), Tubsat ( DLR – Germany), BIRD (DLR – Germany),

PROBA Proba may refer to: ; people * Faltonia Betitia Proba, fourth-century Latin poet * Anicia Faltonia Proba, her niece and the recipient of letters from Saint Augustine and Saint John Chrysostom ; places * Próba, Łódź Voivodeship, village in the ...

(Verhaert,

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

) aboard the ISRO's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (

PSLV The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) is an expendable medium-lift launch vehicle designed and operated by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). It was developed to allow India to launch its Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) satellite ...

). * Execution of many IOT / TTC support services to International Space Agencies. Some of the customers used ''Antrix'' services are World Space,

PanAmSat PanAmSat Corporation was a satellite service provider headquartered in Greenwich, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1984 by Reynold "Rene" Anselmo, it operated a fleet of communications satellites used by the entertainment industry, news a ...

, GE, Americom, AFRISAT etc.

Business agreement

On 29 January 2014, Antrix Corporation Limited (Antrix), the commercial arm of Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), signed Launch Services Agreement with DMC International Imaging (DMCii), the wholly owned subsidiary of Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL), United Kingdom (UK), for launch of three DMC-3 Earth Observation Satellites being built by SSTL, on-board ISRO's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV). On 5 February 2014, Antrix signed another Launch Services Agreement with ST Electronics (Satcom & Sensor Systems) Pte Ltd, Singapore, for launch of TeLEOS-1 Earth Observation Satellite, on-board PSLV. These launches are planned during end 2014 to end 2015. On 29 September 2014, Canada announced that it has decided to give the contract of the July 2015 launch of its M3M ( Maritime Monitoring and Messaging Micro-Satellite) communications satellite to Antrix during the inauguration of the

International Astronautical Congress The International Astronautical Congress (IAC) is an annual meeting of the actors in the discipline of space science. It is hosted by one of the national society members of the International Astronautical Federation (IAF), with the support of ...

at Toronto.

Satellite launches

ISRO has launched 343 foreign satellites for 36 countries. All satellites were launched using the ISRO's

Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) is an expendable medium-lift launch vehicle designed and operated by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). It was developed to allow India to launch its Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) satellite ...

(PSLV)

expendable launch system An expendable launch system (or expendable launch vehicle/ELV) is a launch vehicle that can be launched only once, after which its components are destroyed during reentry or impact with Earth, or discarded in space. ELVs typically consist of s ...

. Between 2013 and 2015, India launched 28 foreign satellites for 13 countries earning a total revenue of US$101 million. Antrix launched 239 satellites between 2016 and 2019 earning a total revenue of .

Controversies

S-band spectrum scam

In January 2005, Antrix Corporation signed an agreement with Devas Multimedia (a private company formed by former ISRO employees and Venture Capitalists from USA) for lease of

S band The S band is a designation by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) for a part of the microwave band of the electromagnetic spectrum covering frequencies from 2 to 4 gigahertz (GHz). Thus it crosses the conventiona ...

transponders on two ISRO satellites (GSAT 6 and GSAT 6A) for a price of , a huge amount lower than market price, to be paid over a period of 12 years. Devas shares were sold at a premium of , taking the accumulated share premium to , thus getting a high profit. In July 2008, Devas offloaded 17% of its stake to German company

Deutsche Telekom Deutsche Telekom AG (, ; often just Telekom, DTAG or DT; stylised as ·T·) is a partially state-owned German telecommunications company headquartered in Bonn and the largest telecommunications provider in Europe by revenue. It was formed in 199 ...

for US$75 million, and by 2010 had 17 investors, including former ISRO scientists. In late 2009, some ISRO insiders exposed information about the Devas-Antrix deal, and the ensuing investigations resulted in the deal being annulled. G. Madhavan Nair (ISRO Chairperson when the agreement was signed) was barred from holding any post under the Department of Space. Some former scientists were found guilty of "acts of commission" or "acts of omission". Devas and Deutsche Telekom demanded US$2 billion and US$1 billion, respectively, in damages. The

Central Bureau of Investigation The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is the domestic crime investigating agency of India. It operates under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions. Originally set up to investigate bribery and gover ...

concluded investigations into the Antrix-Devas scam and registered a case against the accused in the Antrix-Devas deal under Section 120-B, besides Section 420 of

IPC IPC may refer to: Businesses and organizations Arts and media * Intellectual Property Committee, a coalition of US corporations with intellectual property interests * International Panorama Council, an international network of specialists in ...

and Section 13(2) read with 13(1)(d) of PC Act, 1988 on 18 March 2015 against the then executive director, Antrix Corporation Limited, Bengaluru; two officials of USA-based company; Bengaluru based private multi media company and other unknown officials of Antrix Corporation Limited /ISRO/Department of Space.

References

External links

* {{authority control Space programme of India Commercial launch service providers Government-owned companies of India Companies based in Bengaluru Indian Space Research Organisation Indian companies established in 1992 1992 establishments in Karnataka mr:अंतरिक्ष