[Satellite News 05-26-11] Telesat’s new Telstar 14R/Estrela do Sul 2 satellite, which was only launched last week, has suffered an anomaly. Telesat said in a press statement issued May 25 that the satellite’s north solar array had failed to fully deploy. The south solar array has deployed successfully and is providing power to the spacecraft, which is stable and is otherwise operating as expected.

     In his first interview since the announcement, Telesat CEO, Dan Goldberg, talks about the anomaly, how it might impact the operator’s procurement plans of new satellites and what it means for its strategy in Latin America and the maritime communications market — two markets in which the new expansion capacity of Telstar 14R is slated to serve.

 

Goldberg: It is important to keep in mind that it is very early in terms of this anomaly. All the information we are dealing with is still pretty fresh. We are working very closely with Space Systems/Loral (SS/L) to understand the situation and possible actions to resolve the anomaly. We have said that, subject to the remaining deployments and in-orbit testing, at a minimum we would be able to satisfy our existing customer requirements now on Telstar 14, which can support today approximately 30 36 Mhz equivalent transponders. Telstar 14R was designed to support 58 36 Mhz transponders. Telstar 14 is well utilized but not 100 percent utilized. So based on the analysis we have done today and assuming that the testing on Telstar 14R continues to go well, we believe that we will at least be able to support the requirements of our existing Telstar 14 customers.

 

Goldberg: We think, at a minimum, we will be able to support existing customers and expect that Telstar 14R will provide us with some expansion capacity versus Telstar 14, but we are not yet able to say how much. We are also adding some additional Latin American capacity on our Anik G1 satellite that launches next year. So combining the expansion we will get on Anik G1 with Telstar 14R, it is our expectation that we will have some additional capacity to take advantage of the growth we are seeing in Latin America. Maybe not as fully as we could if we had all the capacity available on Telstar 14R, but certainly we expect that we are going to be well positioned to take advantage of favorable demand trends in Latin America.

 

Goldberg: I don’t think so. We believe that Telstar 14R will have some substantial life even with this anomaly. I don’t think this anomaly really changes our procurement plans, certainly not in the next few years.

 

Goldberg: Subject to the rest of the deployments going well for Telstar 14R and the rest of the in-orbit testing and the analysis that has been developed to date on the projected life of the satellite, there is nothing that would prompt us to change our procurement plans any time soon.

Goldberg: We have 12 in-orbit satellites. They are all very important to Telesat. Obviously, different satellites produce different amounts of revenue and EBITDA. But our customers around the world rely on each satellite and we work hard every day to provide them with the performance, reliability and value they expect across our fleet. Telstar 14R is important because it is replacing an existing satellite and we need to provide continuity of service to our existing customers. Telstar 14R is also important because it allows us to expand our activities in some fast growing markets like Latin America and mobile services over the Atlantic — both maritime and aeronautical. 

Goldberg: I would say that all the large operators have experienced issues following launch. Telesat has, as has Loral Skynet, the company we merged with in 2007. Sometimes arrays have not deployed as expected; sometimes you still make use of the satellite. Telesat has had experience operating satellites that have had deployment issues with the arrays that were not corrected. Equally, we have had a situation where a solar array did not deploy as expected and we were able to take measures to open it.

Goldberg: As mentioned, it is still very early in terms of this anomaly. We are working closely with SS/L to set out a timeline. It is our expectation that this satellite will enter service later this summer. We will figure out between now and then what the next steps are. The engineers need to do a thorough job of assessing the situation, and finding the root cause. Then we will look at all the possible measures to address the issue. Part of this effort will be a cost-benefit analysis with alternate scenarios to understand the potential advantages and risks of any specific action. All indications are that Telstar 14R is working fine except for the solar array problem. It is in the control of the manufacturer. There is no urgency at the moment. We have the luxury of being able to take our time and analyze all the data and the telemetry and make judgments on that basis.

 

Goldberg: We think we will have the majority of the capacity available for our use. The question is, can we free the array up and get the full capability of the satellite? We are still working to identify the root cause of the anomaly.

Goldberg: We are already very active in Latin America today. We have our Telstar 12 satellite along with Telstar 14 and Anik F1serving the market. Even our Telstar 11N satellite covers parts of Latin America. We have a strong base of customers throughout the region and we are continuing to see strong demand. Telstar 14R is a great satellite to serve Latin America. The coverage is really optimized to the region’s requirements. The enterprise services market has been strong and we are seeing demand from the many digital divide programs, corporate applications and the region’s resource sectors. There is even some maritime activity taking place. Video is another area of focus. We do less in terms of video services than some of our competitors, but there are more and more opportunities on the video side. Telesat will continue to offer attractive capacity to meet the growing requirements of Latin America.