[Satellite News 07-26-11] Spanish space company GMV will develop the ground segment for Turkish satellite operator Turksat’s 4A and 4B satellites under a 5 million euro ($7.24 million) subcontract issued July 26 by Mitsubishi Electronics.

     The contract will see GMV supply its Hifly satellite monitoring and control product and its FocusGEO flight dynamics system for orbit control. Integrated with other components of the ground segment, the two GMV systems will be installed in a main control center and in the emergency center located in Ankara, Turkey. A system replica also will be installed at Mitsubishi Electronics to facilitate satellite integration and validation tasks. GMV also will manage the migration of the flight dynamics system of Turksat’s whole fleet to FocusGEO to ensure a uniform control procedure for all the satellites.

     Turksat 4A and 4B are scheduled for launch in late 2013 by International Launch Services (ILS) on a Proton rocket. The satellites aim to allow Turksat to offer telecommunications and television services throughout Turkey, Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Both satellites will be based on Mitsubishi Electronics’ DS2000 platform. Turksat 41 will be placed in the 42 degrees East orbital slot and Turksat 5B will be placed at the 50 degrees East slot.

     GMV Aerospace General Manager Jorge Potti said the company’s Türksat and Mitsubishi contracts were important milestones in GMV’s expansion efforts, consolidating the company’s strategic policy of providing its clients with a complete solution for ground-segment projects.

    “We will work with Turksat’s prime contractor Mitsubishi to take on complete responsibility for setting up the satellite ground segment, including on-site deployment and integration and training tests for Turksat’s operators and engineers to familiarize them with the supplied system,” said Potti. “This contract award is a great satisfaction to us as it broadens our portfolio of clients with an operator of the importance of Türksat and a major space systems manufacturer like Mitsubishi Electronics.”

    Turksat currently uses Intelsat capacity to serve the Middle East region under a contract signed in March 2010. The agreement provided Turksat with satellite capacity it needed while it finalized details of its new satellites.

    Turksat Director General Őzkan Dalbay told Satellite News that the launch of Turksat 3A would put the operator in a good position to boost overall revenues. “With the additional capacity of Turksat 3A, we expect a 30 percent increase in our revenues over the next 12 months. From the satellite services perspective, there is certainly a growing market not only from government organizations, but also from non-governmental companies.”

   The contract also is a major step in Mitsubishi Electric’s plan to increase its annual satellite sales to $1.87 billion by March 2021 and double its annual satellite production capacity from four satellites to eight. In June, the Japanese company announced that it would invest about $37.4 million to upgrade its Kamakura Works production facility in Kamakura, Japan to meet its ambitious long-term goals. Mitsubishi officials said the facility would be complete by March 2013.

   “Our new facility will help us reduce costs and shorten delivery time by integrating production processes, component assembly and environmental testing. The enlarged facility will have a total floor space of 7,700 square-meters when it is finished in 2013,” the company said in a statement. “The annual demand for new satellites in the global commercial communications market has risen to about 20, due to the rapid increase in traffic for data and telecommunications.”

   The company said its growth plan was driven by the Japanese Government’s 2009 Basic Plan for Space Policy, which stated that the country’s development and production of satellites should be utilization-driven rather than research and development-driven. The company’s most recent launch came in May, when its ST-2 communications satellite was successfully placed into geostationary orbit for a joint venture between SingTel and Chunghwa Telecom.