Nothing to be excited about this assembly workshop. Yes, it is nothing but a centre to assemble a satelitte, no manufacturing of components here. Japan would be the last one in the world to transfer out any of their hi-technologies.
Everything has a humble beginning my friend. our first rocket ( a small experimental one) was carried on the back carrier of a bicycle. There is a video on YouTube about how we began in space research (with a soundtrack of
Requiem for a Dream). Big achievements are made slowly and steadily. You will also do the same. Right now you are assembling. Do you really think 10 years down the lane you will be doing the same thing. I won't be surprised 5 years from today if I hear of a new VietSat-1 announcement.
We too were once denied everything to build our foundation. But Soviet Union laid the foundations for our space research in modern history, apart from our ancient texts on space and astronomy. West Germans were also initially cooperative. But slowly and steadily, we became self-reliant. We Indians know the pain of what it means to begin in a non-cooperative environment, friend.
Which is why I recommended about cooperation between your STI and our ISRO.
This project is a result of ODA loan sponsored by Japan. Japan will provide all the equipment and components for Viet Nam to do the assembly work, nothing more than that.
Everything today starts with outsourcing. How do you think China gained leaps and bounds so fast? They overshot production rates, and absorbed the technology to copy and then evolve based on it. That is a mean feat in such a short time. You do the same. Don't worry about IPR. Japanese did the same always until WW2 was over.
To tell you guys the truth, I get really tired of seeing Viet Nam doing business with the Japanese; they offer us nothing other than selling us the entire products while refusing to transfer any technology back to us to do our own manufacturing.
Most countries that are either Western or associated with West (like east Asia) do that. Japanese space research has not been such a focused stream and they've more to do with commercial manufactured products in terms of state of the art technology. But you do have friendly countries close to you to help.
I would rather have picked the Korean to be our business partner than the Japanese. At least the Korean were willing to tranfer technology to produce UAV & cruise missiles win the nuclear contract in UAE. We pick Japan and we get nothing.
An excellent choice. Koreans are good at stuff but their space program isn't so mature enough for them to come out and help. They will still need to do a lot more to come up in this field. While their commercial technology is excellent, they are not well known in space sector. Still, it is best to have someone willing to help you out.
South Korea is an excellent option you can explore.
