Another bird for SES Astra

[SAT-WORLD]

Satellite giant SES is ordering a new Astra craft. Astra 1N will be built by EADS-Astrium and ready for launch in 2011. It will be positioned at Astra’s prime European hot spot 19.2 deg East which mostly serves the German, French and Spanish markets.

Astra 1N is a fairly large satellite with 55 pan-European transponders, and will have a design life of 15 years. EADS-Astrium will use the Eurostar 3000 platform, and this order represents the fourth Astra craft to be supplied by Astrium (Astra 2B, Astra 1M and 3B are the others).

SES Astra uses all 120 Ku-band frequencies available to it from the 19.2 deg East position, so this single satellite can be seen as providing some 40% of that capacity. This particular satellite will replace Astra 1G which still has plenty of life left in it, and which will then be moved to another location.

“The procurement of ASTRA 1N represents another important step in our strategy to continuously invest in our core business, and reinforce the high performance and efficiency of our fleet,” said Ferdinand Kayser, President/CEO at SES Astra. “With Astra 1N, we will have completed our comprehensive replacement programme at our prime orbital position of 19.2 degrees East and fully renewed our fleet at that position, thereby maintaining during the next decade the very high quality customer service. This will also enable us to continue to respond to the strong demand for digital and High Definition (HD) capacity, and to provide significant growth potential to key European markets.”

Financial terms were not revealed.

Source:Rapid Tv News