A senior ISRO associate and satellite expert told The Hindu news outlet that the organization is testing the market to find a seller who could manufacture the spacecraft within the next two to three years, as it would take ISRO at least five years to build it on its own.

“We are trying out a different and twin-pronged approach here,” the official said in the report. “Ka-band is the future. The world is moving towards it and if we don’t get in now, we will be left behind. We have started building a six-ton satellite at ISRO facilities, but it will take time. A Ka-band transponder can accommodate far more users more efficiently than our older Ku-band satellites, despite the disadvantage of ‘rain fade’ or disturbed transmission during rain.”

Earlier this month, the ISRO Satellite Center (ISAC) invited proposals from global satellite manufacturers to design, develop, fabricate and operate a 6-ton Ka-band spacecraft that would weigh almost double the size of the biggest that ISRO has produced so far.

ISRO said it believes Ka-band would allow higher and faster Internet data transmission by at least two or three times what ISRO satellites now offer and that it would suit VSAT operators who support this traffic. ISRO attempted to launch its GSAT-4 satellite with a Ka-band transponder in 2010, but the spacecraft’s GSLV launcher failed. The next ISRO satellite to feature a Ka-band transponder is GSAT-11, which is scheduled to launch in 2014 at the earliest.

ISRO also built the Hylas-1 Ka-band satellite for British operator Avanti in 2010 as a cooperative project with European manufacturer Astrium.