14 November 2017
Yang Baohua from the China Aerospace Science and Technological Corporation (CASC), a state-owned entity that develops and manufactures spacecraft and launch vehicles, said the company is “ready to provide cheaper and faster low-earth orbit rocket launches”. The People’s Daily, the Communist Party‘s mouthpiece, quoted Yang as saying: “The price could be as low as $5,000 per kilogram and the pre-launch preparation will only need a week.” “We are quite competitive,” ISRO spokesperson Deviprasad Karnik said, responding to China’s plans. Reacting to China’s plans to drastically reduce launch costs, he said not only is the Indian agency “competitive”, but it is working to reduce the cost of access to space through new technology. The effort is to bring down launch costs to “one-tenth” of what they are now, the official said.
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