New Satellites Emerge from Russia
By Jeffrey Hill | December 26, 2012
Two new satellites have emerged from Russia’s manufacturing sector. The nation of Angola’s first satellite – Angosat – is now being built by a Russian consortium led by RSC and should be launched in three years, Angolan Secretary of State for Telecommunications and Information Technology Alcides Safeca confirmed.
Safeca, who was speaking at a ceremony to mark the start of construction of Angosat, noted that the RSC consortium was building the satellite based on the Yamal platform design. “The RSC consortium is a multinational with extensive experience of making satellites and rockets for international programs such as Soyuz-Apollo,” Safeca said.
A syndicate of Russian banks headed up by Ruseximbank and VTB is financing the satellite, providing approximately $417 million in financial support.
Separately, management officials from Russian space and launch vehicle developer Energia announced the company was completing construction of a new remote Earth probe satellite. Energia Chief Designer Vitaly Lopota told the Russian Interfax news agency hat the optical part of the satellite is being manufactured jointly with Peleng Belarusian and EADS Astrium.
The project was established by a Russian-European joint venture to manufacture communications satellites that was created in 2011.