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BURP!
This is once again a "what happened over the past few days" issue. I expected this for tomorrow but actually I finished my work earlier than expected so I can annoy all my readers with this udderly [moo!] redundant and pretty ignorant so-called newsletter until further notice.
Ikonos 1 is the first satellite of its kind to take pictures of the Earth at levels of detail previously unavailable to commercial users. "We're taking additional measures to ensure 100 percent mission success, with both the launch and the achievement of a world-class imaging capability," said John Copple, Space Imaging's chief executive officer. "Further testing is a necessary precaution to assure our customers that imagery collected by Ikonos will be of the highest quality."
Ikonos 1 is being built by Lockheed Martin Missiles & Space in Sunnyvale, California. It will be launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base aboard an Athena II rocket. Ikonos 2, an identical twin to Ikonos 1, is also scheduled to launch by the end of this year. It will enable Space Imaging to offer imagery twice as frequently as with Ikonos 1.
The deal is estimated to be worth US$550 million. Alcatel and Aerospatiale said the three Ekspress-K satellites would be at least five times more powerful than those currently in service [which still isn't too much, by the way] and would transmit telephone calls, fax and data throughout Russia. They would enable all sectors of the Russian economy to enjoy the same communications standard as the western world.
VisionStar selected Orbital's proposal based on the satellite's high-performance characteristics and its lower manufacturing, launch and acquisition costs compared to satellites offered by competitors. The initial design concept for the VisionStar programme calls for a satellite in the 2,000 kilogram-class with 30 Ka-band broadcast transponders. Under the contract, Orbital's major responsibilities will be to design and manufacture the initial satellite, begin work on a second spacecraft platform and procure launch services aboard a commercial rocket in the class of an Ariane 4 or 5 for a shared launch, or a Delta III for a single payload mission.
Orbital is a US$600 million space and information systems company with over 4,000 employees and operations in eight states and several international locations. It's got its ability to build small GEO satellites from taking over CTA, Inc. last August.
Between 1989 and 1992, just 15 (fifteen) GEO satellites were launched, by the way all much smaller and lighter than those we know nowadays. The report predicts that between 1997 and 2010 GEO launches will be 33 each year.
However, there will be a new market for LEO launches which is expected to average 20 (usually multiple) launches a year for the next decade, the ARC study predicts.
The ARC also examined the current market and concluded that Europe's Arianespace still is market leader with just under half of the world's market for commercial launches. The order books of the established players, however, look more or less the same: Arianespace 43 satellites, Boeing Delta II 42, Lockheed Martin 47 (26 for their Atlas, 21 for Russia's Proton which is marketed by Lockheed.) The Sea Launch project has 18 satellites on order for launch, the Chinese Long March, which according to a proposal by the House of Representatives may be banned from launching U.S.-built satellites, has a backlog of 16 satellites. [Please note that these numbers may not be too accurate as they quite obviously change frequently.]
The name of the mission actually was Kosmos 2349, but not only does Spin-2 sound a bit better, it even means something: Space Information, 2 meters resolution.
The availability of this data results from an agreement between Aerial Images and Sovinformsputnik. An international team managed the remote sensing satellite mission that was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in February 1998 and recovered in April of the same year.
Aerial Images and Sovinformsputnik have planned two additional satellite missions during each of the next two years to complete the imaging of the United States and major population centres around the globe.
Spin-2: http://www.spin-2.com/
The European Union's executive body said in a statement that it was concerned that a subsidiary of Thomson, Thomson Tubes Electroniques (TTE), had a dominant position in the market for travelling waves tubes which still are used in most satellites' transponders. [As far as I know, and I may be wrong as usual, Orion 1 is one of the exceptions as transistor amplifiers are used there. The high linearity of those amplifiers was probably one of the reasons why the spacecraft was--at least initially--marketed as the "digital satellite."]
Anyway, the companies involved in the deal had proposed undertakings to meet these worries, the Commission said. They agreed not to transfer control of TTE's travelling waves tubes business to SCS without the Commission's approval within the next five years .
"For these reasons, the Commission has decided not to oppose the notified transaction and to declare it compatible with the common market, subject to the full compliance by the parties with the undertakings proposed," the Commission's statement added.
Satellite providers must win approval from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission and Argentina's Comite Federal de Radiofusion, or Comfer, to be able to operate under the so-called reciprocity agreement.
The agreement will "provide significant benefits for U.S. and Argentine consumers in the form of lower prices, improved service quality and more innovative service options," according to the State Department statement.
Argentina is the second country to sign such an agreement with the U.S., following a similar U.S.-Mexico deal signed in 1996.
Currently, there is a ban on DTH satellite reception in the Ku-band in India that was imposed by the previous government, mainly to keep Keith Rupert Murdoch's Star TV from offering such services. Nonetheless Star TV can be received via satellite in the C-band and via cable networks, so far reaching just a Western-educated middle class.
Traditionalists fear that foreign satellite networks could undermine the Indian culture by promoting decadence and sexual promiscuity. While this can hardly be denied, it remains to be defined what that actually means. According to Ms Genghis Khan, it's not just the usual blend of sex and violence in fictional U.S. TV productions.
Swaraj's record during a short period as Information Minister back in 1996 was quite impressive. Within less than a fortnight, she announced a ban on "salacious" (immoral) advertisements on state-run television, stopped an AIDS-related chat show on government-controlled radio and outlawed condom advertisements. Reportedly, she even called for a crackdown on women news announcers with short hair.
Motorola, Inc. said it will implement "a comprehensive series of manufacturing consolidations, cost reductions and restructuring steps to improve financial performance."
Christopher B. Galvin, chief executive officer, said, "While we very much regret the impact this will have on certain of our employees, we must adjust our production capacity to the reality of current business conditions and reduce costs to improve overall financial performance."
The company also announced the following actions:
--Consolidation of manufacturing operations throughout the company, with emphasis on the Semiconductor Products and Messaging, Information and Media segments.
--Exit of additional non-strategic, poorly performing businesses.
--Write-down of assets, the value of which has become impaired, either as a result of current business conditions or business portfolio decisions.
For a special reason, the installation of the system had to be completed by the end of May. RCN-TV has the shared Colombian rights for broadcasting the World Cup '98 football [soccer] tournament. Colombia's first round match against Romania is on 15 June 1998. "The goal of broadcasting Colombia's World Cup soccer matches, in a nation where soccer is the major sport, is clear motivation for having the new installation up and ready for its May 31st 1998 start date," said Mr. Ricardo Londono, President of RCN TV.
Phase one of the broadcast system contract, worth US$1.4 million, includes an uplink hub in Bogota that comprises several Andrew Corporation C-Band Earth Station Antennas mounted on the roof of RCN's TV production facilities. Countrywide coverage is ensured by a network of 20 remote, receive-only sites across Colombia, each of which in the first phase have an Andrew 3.6-meter Earth Station Antenna. The two-port receive antennas are circularly polarised to enable use of Intelsat, the primary satellite system used for the distribution of the RCN-TV network.
Andrew Corporation: http://www.andrew.com/
"Seems they weren't looking ... When the BJP government came to power in March, there had been a flurry of concern in the U.S., because of the BJP's declared intention of adding nuclear weapons to India's arsenal. But the BJP government told them not to worry. So they didn't."
Sudhanshu Ranade in 'The Hindu,' June 6, 1998
"Accordingly, SkyBridge adds 16 satellites, not 32." Alain is right, of course. Thank you very much for the correction!
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