Ramnath Shenoy / PTI
 
Bangalore, Jul 26: India plans to double its annual satellite launches and put into space up to 25 spacecraft in a two-billion-dollar exercise spread over the next five years as it moves to take advantage of booming demand for capacity, country's space agency chief said.

New Delhi will increase its satellite transponders from the current figure of 199 to 500 by the end of the 11th Five Year Plan (March 2012), said G Madhavan Nair, Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Space Commission.

"On an average, we may have about four to five launches in a year compared to hardly two that we are (currently) doing annually", Nair, also the Secretary in the Department of Space, told PTI in an interview.

"That's one of the major loads not only on ISRO but on industry and other establishments in the country", he said.

ISRO officials estimate the cost involved in building these satellites and launching them in the region of Rs 8,000 crore-Rs 9,000 crore (approximately two billion-2.25 billion dollars).

The Bangalore-headquartered space agency plans to launch as many as 15 INSAT-class satellites and 8-10 remote sensing spacecraft by 2012 as it moves to stay ahead of the demand curve.