Named Rocket Factory 1, it was unveiled by Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran and Isro chairman S Somanath in the presence of Pawan Goenka, the chairman of IN-SPACe (Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Centre). The 10,000-square-foot facility is located at IIT-Madras Research Park. It will have a 400mm x 400mm x 400mm metal 3D-printer from EOS that will enable end-to-end manufacturing of a rocket engine under one roof
The manufacturing facility has a capacity to make two rocket engines per week and thereby one launch vehicle every month, Agnikul co-founder Srinath Ravichandran told TOI.
“This is a milestone for us as we go from R&D phase into core manufacturing with the opening of this facility, and begin productionizing the launch vehicle engine making. We have a lot of inbound interest [for launches] from global quarters going up to 2024,” Ravichandran said.
“At full scale, the facility will have around 30-35 people working on various processes and machinery, and we have already staffed the factory with over 90% staff,” he added.
Agnikul was founded in 2017 by Srinath Ravichandran, Moin SPM and SR Chakravarthy (professor of IIT-Madras). The startup is making Agnibaan, a customizable, 2-stage launch vehicle, capable of taking up to 100 kg payload to orbits around 700 km high (low Earth orbits) and enables plug-and-play configuration.
In December 2020, Agnikul had signed an agreement with Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) under the IN-SPACe initiative to have access to the space agency’s expertise and its facilities to build rocket engines.