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Innovations for Defence Excellence (iDEX), the flagship initiative of the Ministry of Defence, has signed its 250th contract -- the first under Mission DefSpace -- and 100th SPRINT (Navy) contract in New Delhi.

The first iDEX contract of Mission DefSpace was exchanged between Additional Secretary (Defence Production) and CEO Defence Innovation Organisation (DIO) T. Natarajan and CEO of InspeCity, Arindrajit Chowdhary, one of the winners of the 'Micropropulsion system for CubeSats' challenge. This challenge is being led by the Defence Space Agency.

Cubesats are a class of smallsats, which are modular; low-cost, easy to manufacture, integrate, and launch; and form a critical component for launch-on-demand capabilities.

According to the Ministry of Defence, for imagery, Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance or communication purposes, CubeSats need to be precisely aligned, hence there is a requirement of a compact micropropulsion system for precise manoeuvring and orbit correction.

InspeCity is developing a gas-based system for this purpose. This technology, once developed, can be integrated with other satellites, including the CubeSat swarm being developed under Mission DefSpace, a Ministry of Defence official added.

Recognising the strategic significance of the space domain, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched Mission DefSpace with 75 Defence Space Challenges to be addressed by the private sector during DefExpo at Gandhinagar in October 2022. It aims to nurture the Indian Private Space industry through challenges addressing every stage of a space mission -- from mission planning to satellite data analytics.

In the presence of Defence Secretary Giridhar Aramane the 100th SPRINT (Navy) contract was exchanged between AS (DP) and CEO-DIO and CEO, Siliconia Technologies Pvt Ltd Sushil Eknath Ghule.

Siliconia Technologies Pvt Ltd is the winner of the challenge which envisaged the development of a prototype that is a lightweight ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit)-based communication system using software defined antenna for low earth orbit, medium earth orbit and geostationary satellite communication.

The solution by Siliconia can provide multiple independent receiver/transmitter sources that are essential in phased-array radars, typically used in satellite tracking.

The Ministry said that under the 'SPRINT' initiative, a total of 75 Challenge statements for the Indian industry were unveiled by Modi during the Naval Innovation and Indigenisation Organisation (NIIO) seminar 'Swavlamban' on July 18, 2022. The initiative aims at inducting at least 75 technologies or products into the Indian Navy by August 2023.

The Defence Ministry said that the iDEX achieved the milestone of signing its first and 50th iDEX SPRINT contracts under DISC-7 in October 2022 and January 2023, respectively, and within a few months the 100th SPRINT (Navy) contract was exchanged.