Hylas-1, the UK’s latest satellite, is ready to do business. Astrium, which built the ‘highly adaptable satellite’ says it will hand over the orbiting satellite to Avanti Communications next week having completed its in-orbit testing of the craft.

Hylas-1 was launched back in November. “In recent months HYLAS 1 has undergone a series of tests to verify and validate the performance of its flexible payload, which is designed to allocate varying amounts of power and bandwidth to the different regions within its footprint, reacting to the highs and lows of traffic demand.”

Avanti’s CEO David Williams said that Hylas-1 was Europe’s first fully operational broadband satellite “we are highly confident of achieving rapid commercial success for this powerful and flexible satellite.” Mr Williams’ statement, while technically true, seems to forget the many other satellites already operational which also carry Ka-band capacity, and also the massive Ka-Sat craft from Eutelsat which is now undergoing its final in-orbit tests.

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