ISRO Achieves Major Milestone With Indigenous Microprocessors for Space Missions

India has achieved a significant milestone in space-grade electronics with the development of two fully indigenous 32-bit microprocessors, VIKRAM3201 and KALPANA3201, designed specifically for ISRO's launch vehicle applications.

On March 5, 2025, the first production lots of the 32-bit microprocessors developed for space applications, VIKRAM3201 & KALPANA3201, were handed over to Dr. V. Narayanan, Secretary, DOS /Chairman, ISRO by Shri S. Krishnan, Secretary, MeitY, in a function organised at New Delhi by the Semiconductor Laboratory (SCL), Chandigarh.

• VIKRAM3201: This is the first fully indigenous, space-qualified 32-bit microprocessor fabricated in India. It supports custom instruction sets, floating-point computation, and high-level language support for Ada. It has already proven its space-worthiness in the PSLV-C60 mission.
• KALPANA3201: Based on the SPARC V8 RISC architecture, this microprocessor is versatile and compatible with open-source software tool sets.

These chips were developed by the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre and manufactured at the Semiconductor Laboratory in Chandigarh. They represent a generational leap from the earlier 16-bit processors and mark a step forward in India's self-reliance in critical space technologies.

Notably, VIKRAM1601 was ISRO's first indigenous 16-bit microprocessor, operational in launch vehicle avionics since 2009. A fully "Make-in-India" version was introduced in 2016 after domestic fabrication capabilities matured.

Four other devices that were jointly developed with SCL were also handed over towards significant miniaturisation of the launch vehicle Avionics system. This includes two versions of a Reconfigurable Data Acquisition System (RDAS) integrating multiple indigenously designed 24-bit Sigma-Delta Analog to Digital Converters on a single chip along with a Relay driver Integrated Circuit & a Multi-Channel Low Drop-out Regulator Integrated Circuit for high reliability applications.