Advanced Television

Clutch of launch orders from Paris

September 15, 2015

By Chris Forrester

The annual Euroconsult Paris Satellite Business Week always generates plenty of press releases, and this week’s conflab is no exception.

International Launch Services (ILS), which handles commercial launches for the Russian Proton rocket system, says that it has won an early 2017 launch of a satellite for Madrid-based Hispasat.

The satellite will be built by Space Systems/Loral (SS/L) although it is not yet clear whether the ILS launch will be for the SS/L built Hispasat 1F or Amazonas 5 craft.

Meanwhile ILS’ rival SpaceX also announced two launch contracts for its Falcon-9 and Falcon-9 ‘Heavy’ launcher. They say they have an order for a Hispast craft (which means it is one of the pair under construction by SS/L).

SpaceX adds that it will also launch Arabsat 6A upon its Falcon-9 Heavy rocket. The two launches are planned for between late-2017 and 2018.

These latest pair takes the SpaceX launch manifest to more than 60 missions and representing some 7 billion under contract.

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