Latest News

Japanese Telecom Satellite Readied For Launch

By Staff Writer | April 12, 2004

      A Boeing [BA]-built communications satellite that would help Space Communication Corporation (SCC) of Japan to provide telecommunications and data services to customers in Asia is scheduled to launch this Thursday, April 15, from Cape Canaveral Air Station in Florida.

      Known as Superbird-6, the spacecraft is scheduled to launch on an Atlas rocket within a 33-minute launch window that opens at 8:45 p.m. EDT. Superbird-6 would join the existing Superbird constellation and would allow SCC to continue meeting the strong demand for business telecommunications services throughout Japan and the Asia-Pacific region.

      The satellite carries a payload with 23 active Ku-band and four Ka-band transponders for high-data-rate communications that will provide television news gathering, distance learning, Internet access, VSAT and other services to customers in the Asia-Pacific, said David Ryan, president of Boeing Satellite Systems International, a wholly owned subsidiary of BSS.