Boeing-Built Communications Satellite Ready for Liftoff
ST. LOUIS, April 12, 2004 -- A Boeing [NYSE:BA] -built communications satellite that will serve the Asia-Pacific market is scheduled to launch on Thursday, April 15, from Cape Canaveral Air Station in Florida.
Known as Superbird-6, the spacecraft was designed and manufactured by Boeing for Space Communication Corporation (SCC) of Japan to provide telecommunications and data services to customers in Asia. Launch is scheduled to occur within a 33-minute launch window that opens at 8:45 p.m. EDT (12:45 a.m. April 16 GMT).
Superbird-6 will join the existing Superbird constellation and allow SCC to continue meeting the strong demand for business telecommunications services throughout Japan and the Asia-Pacific region. Superbird-6 is the third satellite Boeing Satellite Systems (BSS) has built for SCC.
"Superbird-6 benefits from a long heritage of innovations and recent improvements in our design, assembly and test processes that have enabled us to provide robust transmission technologies for emerging high-data-rate services," said David Ryan, president of Boeing Satellite Systems International, a wholly owned subsidiary of BSS. "This 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 throughout the Asia-Pacific region."
Boeing Satellite Systems built the Boeing 601 spacecraft in El Segundo, Calif.
Slated to occupy an orbital slot at 158.0 degrees East longitude, Superbird-6 will provide business telecommunication services to customers in Japan. The spacecraft's Steerable Ka-band Spot Beam also will enable SCC to provide higher data rate Ka-band service to areas across a broad swathe of the Pacific region including Japan, Australia, Micronesia, Hawaii, Taiwan, Korea and New Zealand.
Space Communications Corporation (SCC), a Japanese satellite communications service company, was established in 1985 by Mitsubishi Corporation (MC), Mitsubishi Electric Corporation (MELCO), and other Mitsubishi Group Companies. SCC now operates four communications satellites named Superbird-A, B2, C, and D in four orbital slots, by which SCC is providing stable and high quality telecommunication services to a wide range of customers.
A unit of The Boeing Company, Boeing Integrated Defense Systems is one of the world's largest space and defense businesses. Headquartered in St. Louis, Boeing Integrated Defense Systems is a $27 billion business. It provides systems solutions to its global military, government and commercial customers. It is a leading provider of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance systems; the world's largest military aircraft manufacturer; the world's largest satellite manufacturer and a leading provider of space-based communications; the primary systems integrator for U.S. missile defense; NASA's largest contractor; and a global leader in launch services.
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Contact Info:
Joseph Tedino
The Boeing Company
(202) 285-9559
joseph.j.tedino@boeing.com
Marta Newhart
The Boeing Company
(562) 797-2718
marta.e.newhart@boeing.com
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