[rajathagasthya]

This is a big deal for ISRO when it becomes operational. In terms of launching its own heavy communication satellites, it doesn't have to rely on the Ariane. I can see a lot of customers queuing up to Antrix to launch commercial satellites. One can hope it eats into SpaceX's lunch in the near future.

[greglindahl]

The last 2 Indian satellites launched on Ariane V fit on this new rocket (~3.2 metric tons), but, that's a medium-sized satellite. Ariane V usually launches pairs of satellites, one ~ 3mt and one ~ 6mt.

As for price, surfing the Internets I see Rs 350 to Rs400 crore as a price, which ~ $56-$64 million dollars. SpaceX's price for a "flight proven" GTO launch is supposedly $62 million less 10%, or about the same.

[rajathagasthya]

GSLV MK3 is a crucial enabling technology for future applications for ISRO. They plan to human certify it. But most importantly, it's planned to evolve into new family of launch vehicles called Unified Launch Vehicle (ULV). A new SCE-200 semi-cryogenic engine which is under development and other upgrades could enhance the payload capacity to 6 metric tons. So the ULV will eventually replace PSLV and the GSLV MK2.

As for pricing, I definitely agree SpaceX has the edge especially with their reusable rockets. But one can still hope ISRO catches up :)