Vikram

• Now the Indian Space Research Organisation has returned in triumph, with the Chandrayaan-3 lander successfully touching down near the south pole of Earth’s rocky neighbour.
• Moon missions in particular are still a coin flip, and we have seen several high-profile failures in recent years.

An exclusive club

• It makes sense to go there first: it’s the closest planetary body to us, at a distance of around 400,000 kilometres.
• Yet only four countries have achieved successful “soft landings” – landings which the spacecraft survives – on the lunar surface.
• China was the next country to join the club, with the Chang'e 3 mission in 2013.

Crashes are not uncommon

• Attempts to contact the spacecraft on August 20 were unsuccessful, leading Roscosmos to determine Luna 25 had crashed.
• Despite more than 60 years of spaceflight experience extending from the USSR to modern Russia, this mission failed.
• Here's why that's unlikely

  The Luna 25 failure recalled two high-profile lunar crashes in 2019.

Space is still risky

• Space missions are a risky business.
• Even small satellite missions to Earth’s orbit don’t have a perfect track record, with a success rate somewhere between 40% and 70%.
• We could compare uncrewed with crewed missions: around 98% of the latter are successful, because people are more invested in people.

The big picture

• There are around 1.5 billion cars in the world, and perhaps 40,000 aeroplanes.
• By contrast, there have been fewer than 20,000 space launches in all of history.
• And we have more than a century of experience with these vehicles, in every country on the planet.

Monumental challenges remain

• If humanity is ever to create a fully fledged space-faring civilisation, we must overcome monumental challenges.
• To make long-duration, long-distance space travel possible, there are a huge number of problems to be solved.

• SAN FRANCISCO, May 30, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Astreya, a leading provider of IT Managed Services, is excited to announce the appointment of Vikram Anerao as the Vice President of Digital Engineering.
• Vikram will lead the Digital Integration Practice while sharing responsibilities within the Software Engineering division as the company expands.
• Vikram's extensive expertise will significantly contribute to Astreya's growth and play a pivotal role in supporting the business expansion of digital engineering services.
• "We are delighted to welcome Vikram Anerao to the Astreya family as our new VP of Digital Engineering.

• Intentsify , the Intelligence Activation Platform for buying-intent signals and Demand Activation Programs provider, today announced a significant expansion of its executive team with the hire of Anudit Vikram, Chief Product Officer and General Manager, Digital.
• As Intentsifys CPO and GM, Digital, he will propel the companys growth by bringing impactful products to market faster and fostering a world-class team.
• With his extensive experience in the B2B martech space, were thrilled to have Anudit head up our product team, said Intentsify CEO Marc Laplante.
• Prior to Intentsify, Vikram served in leadership positions at MediaMath, Dun & Bradstreet, Merkle, Yahoo!, Microsoft, and other noteworthy organizations.

• Dr. Sharma joins other WSJ CEO Council members such as Arvind Krishna, CEO, IBM; Bernard Mensah, President, International, Bank of America; Punit Renjen, CEO, Deloitte; and Gregory Hayes, Chairman and CEO, Raytheon, among others.
• I am grateful to the Wall Street Journal CEO Council for this prestigious invitation.
• The Wall Street Journal CEO Council is an invitation-only group of over 250 members of the worlds leading CEOs and ambitious and influential global business leaders.
• For more information about the Wall Street Journal CEO Council, visit https://ceocouncil.wsj.com/ .