Asia Pacific

Telesat announced on 2 April 2019 that PT iForte Solusi Infotek (iForte), a leading provider of USO (Universal Service Obligation) VSAT services in Indonesia, has signed major contracts for Ku-band HTS and C-band capacity on Telesat’s new Telstar 18 VANTAGE satellite.

India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C45) successfully launched EMISAT and 28 international customer satellites from Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) SHAR in Sriharikota. This flight marked the first mission of PSLV-QL, a new variant of PSLV with four strap-on motors.

A Rocket Lab Electron launch vehicle successfully lifted off from Launch Complex 1 on New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula at 23:27, 28 March 2019 UTC (12:27, 29 March NZDT). The mission launched a prototype reflect array antenna to orbit for the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

By Blaine Curcio and Tianyi Lan China’s recently-rising space industry has caught a huge number of headlines and generated much buzz, including several articles written for this column. For good reason, this has taken many headlines. But a different type of space-related industry has seen Chinese presence abroad for some time—that is, the satellite broadcast industry.

OneSpace Technology Group, a Chinese private space launch group based in Beijing, has failed in its second attempt to orbit a satellite.

Singapore Technologies Engineering Ltd (ST Engineering) announced on 27 March 2019 that its subsidiary Singapore Technologies Engineering (Europe) Ltd, has entered into a conditional share purchase agreement to acquire a 100% ownership in Newtec Group NV, an established Belgium-based company in the satellite communications industry.

Spaceflight will launch 21 spacecraft on a rideshare mission from India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) at India’s Satish Dhawan Space Center. The launch is scheduled for Mon., April 1, 2019 Indian Standard Time (Sun., March 31 PDT).

As part of a global industry research project, combustion experts from the University of Sydney's School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering are one step closer to developing a more efficient and cost-effective access to space platform for satellite launches.

India's Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) successfully carried out the country's first anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon test against an out-of-service Indian satellite orbiting the Earth at 300 kilometres altitude on Wednesday, 27 March 2019, at 11.16 am Indian Time.

Phase Four, makers of electric radio frequency (RF) thrusters for in-space propulsion, has announced a new agreement with Japan-based advanced spacecraft experts, Sunrise.