Silicon Valley’s space race is heating up. Last month, Elon Musk’s private aerospace company SpaceX announced its ambitions to land an unmanned spacecraft on the surface of the red planet. “Planning to send Dragon to Mars as soon as 2018,” the announcement read. “Red Dragons will inform overall Mars architecture, details to come.” And Amazon C.E.O. Jeff Bezos said that his aerospace company Blue Origin could start flying people to space by 2018. “We’ll probably fly test pilots in 2017, and if we’re successful then I’d imagine putting paying astronauts on in 2018,” he told reporters during Blue Origin’s first media tour. Both Bezos and Musk’s companies seek to use reusable spacecraft and rockets. Both companies have conducted a series of tests over the past year, and seem to be further along in their goals than any U.S. government space agency.

While these American tech billionaires are duking it out to offer humans rides into space, India has also quietly made strides with its spacecraft. On Monday, the country launched a one-fifth scale model of a full-sized reusable spacecraft. The Indian Space Research Organisation completed the test in 13 minutes, blasting off on a rocket on India’s southeastern coast and reaching an altitude of 65 kilometers, Bloomberg reports. On Twitter, Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated the Indian Space Research Organisation for the country’s "first indigenous space shuttle” successfully launching. India’s endgame isn’t to send people to Mars or the Moon; instead, its reusable spacecraft is intended to be a more cost-effective way for launching satellites and similar services, putting the country into direct competition with Musk.

Two years ago, India spent just $74 million to put a probe into Mars’ orbit. While the country is likely years away from having a full-scale version of a reusable spacecraft, Monday’s successful launch shows promise. “While India’s effort is behind the likes of SpaceX and Blue Origin, there are still others further behind and all of the solutions remain to be proven, both technically and from a cost perspective," aerospace specialist David Wireman told Bloomberg. "Although the technical hurdles are quite high, it’s reasonable to believe India can be successful."