Why Africa is doubling down on its space ambitions

As a child in Ivory Coast, West Africa, Tidiane Ouattara gathered with friends in his village to look at the stars. The group, who called themselves "the Moon Club," lay on the ground and looked up at the cosmos.

"We believed we could talk to the moon," he told CNN in a video interview. "From that moment on, space was a curiosity for me."

His youthful interest in space never waned, and in 1994 it led him to Canada, where he earned a doctorate in remote sensing and geographic information systems. He had planned to return to Africa when he ...