SpaceX Manned Space Launch; Inspiration for Pakistani Aerospace & Hi-Tech Industry:  Do we have lessons for this for Pakistan?

By Dr. Haroon Javed Qureshi, PhD
President Pakistan Aerospace Council

Private Pakistan Aerospace and High-Tech Industry is not about making a plane, it is the elements that go in plane, that we are after.

Most people believe that Pakistani Private Aerospace Industry is about making another Airbus or Boeing aircraft; China, Brazil and South Africa for years and years were suppliers/ manufacturers of elements that go into making Boeing, Airbus, Bombardier and more before they acquire enough experience, skills resources to consider making airplanes themselves.

Pakistani private high-tech aerospace industry (or in the making industry)  is currently looking forward to becoming a supplier /manufacturer of elements that are needed by European & USA suppliers/manufacturers of elements that they actually supply to the Aviation Majors, the likes of Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier. It is like just like the auto industry supply chain in Pakistan, the 3000 Pakistani manufacturers are no Toyota or Honda, they are producers of parts and sub-parts that go into making complete automobiles, not only in Pakistan, Europe and USA.

However, if the same effort is put into manufacturing parts for the aviation industry with more attention to quality (at least the mechanical elements) the aerospace industry is willing to pay 100 times more for!!! Parts for the Aerospace Industry are often manufactured in smaller job lots, with higher quality and precision, a model that suits the Pakistani Industrial eco-system. This is where the challenge and opportunity for the Pakistani Hi-Tech Industry is, as we have the “know-how” and in many cases “do-how”.

An example: since I belong to the electronics Industry and have academic & industrial electronics background; I have first-hand knowhow of the subject: every flying aircraft is equipped with 1 ~ 3 Avionics Navigation Radio, such Radios cost US$ 4,000-75,000 each. The actual component value that goes in the production of such a Radio is perhaps US$ 1000-10,000; the rest of the value rest in the “know-how” and “do-how”. That is the segment Pakistan can excel in; we have a large young technical engineering workforce.

Unfortunately, currently if you talk about a Radio; alarm bells start ringing up and down the halls of MOD or Avn Division or some Gora /Kala Babu; we have to get an NOC or Permission of one sort or another, issued; stating that a Radio that “may” get produced will not be used against the integrity of this Nation; even before you get the stuff off the drawing board to a prototype.

The battle is at the grass roots, which PAeC we are fighting, so that we leave enough grass root industry that our coming generations in 15-30 years can someday be the Embraer, Cessna, Bombardier of Pakistan.  Most abinitio Aircraft industry around the world started in bicycle shops; Honda, Mitchel (2nd WW fighter manufacturer), Messerschmitt (German Legend) to name a few; ALL the innovation and technology was developed my private owners & designers. The aircraft industry itself is on 50-80 years old; so, we are not too late.

We do not have to start where all of pioneers did, we can leap-frog, especially with the electrics of the future; if we can get the government “off our backs” and do away with NOC & Permission culture.

During the cold war US (NASA) and former USSR fed the space program trillions of dollars to get to the moon. USSR capitulated from the economic woes to an extent that they were unable to launch 3-4 satellites every year needed to keep their GLONASS GPS constellation alive, and had to hand it over to India for several years, before they were able to sell enough oil and gas to the west to fund their own space programs.

NASA was so heavy that the US tax payers could not afford it anymore; to an extent that the space leaders could not afford to launch anything in the space for over 10 years; then Elon Musk’s SpaceX came along: and showed the world that more could be done for less by the private Industry. Now space launch can be done for a quarter of the cost NASA used to spend.

Is there a lesson for this for the Pakistani high tech Industry? Only if the government lets us free to innovate and do what the private industry thinks is feasible and viable; promise we will not use any tax payers money and in fact will generate taxes for the government.

Pakistani High-tech Industry is not afraid of the competition, our government is our biggest competition; they are the ones we need to be freed from. Private Industry takes risk of investing and innovating in a market segment; if they succeed they make a name and profits; if they fail they lose their investment: why should we need the governments’ “john henry” on a piece of NOC or Permission, what stake do they have; someone needs to make them see that the Gora Badshah left 73 years ago.

Let us take a shot at the 3.3 trillion international aerospace market; Pakistani Aerospace Hi-tech Industry needs to take off… let us loose.