Satellite operator Telesat saw its Q3 revenues (to September 30^th) decline 4 per cent to C$214 million (€144.7m). The operator’s 9-months revenue picture was a little better, declining 2 per cent to C$675 million. Telesat’s contracted backlog grew to C$4 million.

“I am pleased with our performance for the quarter,” commented Dan Goldberg, Telesat’s President and CEO. “Although revenue and Adjusted EBITDA were lower relative to the same period last year, fleet utilisation and contractual backlog improved slightly compared to the second quarter of this year, which shows a favourable level of business activity.”

“In this regard, we closed a significant pre-launch, fifteen-year contract with our longstanding customer Bell Canada for nearly all of the high throughput capacity serving northern Canada on the Telstar 19 VANTAGE satellite. Looking ahead, we remain focused on increasing the utilisation of our available in-orbit capacity, maintaining our operating discipline and executing on our key growth initiatives, including the launch later this year of the first of our Low Earth Orbit satellites and the construction of Telstar 19 VANTAGE and Telstar 18 VANTAGE for launch in 2018.”

Goldberg also commented on the proposals from Intelsat and Intel to make use of C-band frequencies in some urban areas of the USA for 5G services . “We operate certain C-band satellites, including at least three C-band satellites serving the US and we have market access for those,” he said. “We are looking at what Intelsat has proposed. Beyond that, we need to do a little bit more analysis, and then we’ll come out and share our perspective on it.”

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