The Indian and French space agencies both recognised the value of pooling resources.

One June 6, 2023, a meeting was held between CNES and ISRO at ISRO’s headquarters in Bengaluru. A meeting between ISRO and Arianespace, a company jointly founded by ESA and CNES was also held on the same day. ISRO Chairman S Somanath head the delegation from ISRO, while the CNES President Philippe Baptiste led the French side. The meeting was held to foster innovation, share knowledge, and explore potential areas for future collaborations.

ISRO and CNES have enjoyed over six decades of collaboration. On the agenda was the development of ground stations, space situational awareness, novel propulsion technologies, space-based navigation and even potential co-operations in human spaceflight. The space agencies of the two nations recognised the value of sharing expertise and infrastructure to boost advancement. One of the areas of focus was the evolution of climate monitoring, and the role of the space agencies in procuring and processing the data.

ISRO and Arianespace have been collaborating since the launch of the Ariane Passenger Payload Experiment (APPLE) spacecraft in 1981, which was India’s first communications satellite. The meeting took place between S Somanath, Arianespace CEO Stephane Israel, and Programme Director Marc Grosheitsch. They discussed the increased demand for satellite deployments, and avenues for partnership in the commercial launch services market. One of the points of discussion was using the LVM3 and the Ariane-5/6 for complementary missions.

In both the meetings ISRO Chairman S Somanath focused on the increasing role of NSIL and future space activities by India, and the changed mandate of ISRO to focus on basic research and development, while enabling the private sector to carry on the role of space missions and maintaining a regular launch cadence.