I wrote that comment, however I'm not sure if the tour guide who showed us around was telling the truth- He might be lying, I don't know. You are right in the p

I wrote that comment, however I'm not sure if the tour guide who showed us around was telling the truth- He might be lying, I don't know. You are right in the part that clean room practices are very important for missions like these. In the meanwhile I came across one more article : http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2013-10-31/news/43561612_1_moon-mission-chandrayaan-i-isro http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2013-10-31/news... This article highlights some points as to why the cost would be so less. >>Some of them were puzzled by ISRO's style of working. They were just 18 months away from the launch date, and ISRO was only beginning to cut metal. One of the foreign partners had then asked ISRO managers: "Are you serious?" If I'm not wrong NASA tests and validates the equipment they send into space for years. They also take a lot of time and observe very strict quality practices to ensure the equipment doesn't fail or malfunction in space. This leads to them frequently missing deadlines and over shooting budgets by large amounts. Something that ISRO doesn't. Of course then they have a larger chance of running into failures. But then one wouldn't consider it a big loss to spend just $75 million and fail compared to similar projects in other countries that cost almost 7 times more. >>tacitly acknowledged the value of the organisation's minimalist approach. "The told us after the launch," says M Annadurai, project manager of Chandrayaan, "that this was the Indian style of working". India has a lot of talent and lot of young people wanting to succeed and prove their worth to the world. Given the mere population scale and level of desperateness to succeed. You will always run into ingenious people very often. Most of them come from small towns and lower middle class families who need a job at any cost, even if they have to work 16 hours a day, at whatever salary they are offered. I was one such guy myself at one point of time. I've worked at a assembly line, call center, installed BSNL modems and now as a programmer. I know many of many friends from the villages who aspire to do anything thing can, with whatever means they have. So I won't be surprised if they are succeeding in hiring some very brilliant people at the salaries they pay. >>"Frugal engineering comes naturally to Indians," says National Research Professor RA Mashelkar, "which is why India delivers more than any other country per dollar of R&D investment." Mashelkar, along with management theorist CK Prahlad I don't believe this is unique to Indians, but in general when you have fewer resources you tend to optimize you work to squeeze the most of whatever you have. And then finally some budget and schedule discipline. >>"Testing is expensive," says Radhakrishnan, "and we try to get the maximum information from each test." ISRO engineers worked round the clock, often in shifts, when the satellite was being made. and >>"ISRO is one of the few organisations in India that is driven by schedules," says Rajan. So in short, work with passionate, hardworking people, save money by sticking to strict schedules, do not build anything unless you need, once you build test minimally but sufficient enough and quickly.