Orbital ATK components to be used for Azerbaijan's second satellite

Baku, Azerbaijan, Oct. 30

By Huseyn Valiyev - Trend:

Orbital ATK signed a five-year contract with Space Systems / Loral (SSL) to supply the fuel tanks for the 1300 SSL platform, Orbital ATK said.

The world leading platform for 1300 SSL commercial satellites (second Azerbaijani telecommunication satellite "Azerspace-2 / Intelsat 38" will be built on this basis) is used for rendering the television, broadband Internet, mobile communication services and others.

Orbital ATK's fuel tanks are currently used in the propulsion of military, scientific and commercial satellites, launch vehicles and space exploration vehicles.

Azerbaijan's first telecom satellite, Azerspace/Africasat-1a was modelled on the STAR-2 platform of American company Orbital ATK.

The Azerspace/Africasat-1a was launched from the ELA-3 launch complex at Guiana Space Center on Feb. 8, 2013 using an Ariane 5 ECA carrier rocket of the French company Arianespace.

The second satellite, Azerspace-2/Intelsat 38, will be manufactured by Space Systems/Loral. The second satellite program will be financed with help of a long-term and concessional loan line from the Export Development Canada (EDC).

The State Procurement Agency of Azerbaijan said earlier that the cost of a second satellite program in Azerbaijan would amount to $191.36 million. It is scheduled for launch in 2017.

The satellite will be located at the 45 degrees east orbital location leased by the Azerbaijani side from the International Telecommunications Satellite Organization Intelsat, which is the leaseholder of 45.9 percent of the satellite's resources. The service area of Azerspace-2 will cover Europe, South-East Asia, Middle East and Africa.

Geostationary satellite will be equipped with transponders of Ku- and Ka-band. Azerspace-2 is designed to provide digital broadcasting, Internet access, data transmission, creation of VSAT multiservice networks, and so on.