India became the world's fourth nation on Thursday to achieve the feat of space docking, a technological milestone that underscores its ambitions to expand its share of a rapidly growing $400-billion global space market.

India on Thursday became the fourth country to successfully achieve an unmanned docking in space, a feat seen as pivotal for future missions as New Delhi cements its place as a global space power.

According to ISRO, the SpaDeX mission is a cost-effective technology demonstrator mission for the demonstration of in-space docking using two small spacecraft that was launched by PSLV.