Asia Pacific

In another sign of growing Japanese strategic influence in Southeast Asia, a senior Japanese official has revealed that Malaysia is seeking satellite and other strategic technologies from the Japanese government and industry.

Dr. Roger Tong was appointed the new Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of AsiaSat on 16 April 2018 after Andrew Jordan, who held the company's top spot since late 2016 stepped down. Mr. Jordan will stay on as a senior advisor until the end of October 2018.

South Korea is considering joining the quest to clean up space debris in Earth orbit, and with it could end up unintentionally developing a dual-use antisatellite (ASAT) system. Following similar recent efforts by Japan and Europe, South Korea’s Ministry of Science and Information Communication Technology (ICT) held a meeting last week with industry, universities, and institutes in Seoul to discuss technologies to monitor the rising threat of space junk, as well as the development of technologies to remove space debris in Earth's orbit.

Following quickly on the heels of their expansive space cooperation agreement signed last month, India and France are moving forward by holding detailed talks about building and sending interplanetary probes to Mars and Venus in the coming years.

Earth-i has released the first video taken by VividX2, the technology prototype for its Vivid-i constellation. Launched on 12 January 2018, VividX2 is the world’s first commercial satellite able to provide full-colour video of life on earth. Weighing 100kg and measuring approximately 1 cubic metre, VividX2 is orbiting at 505km above the Earth and travelling at approximately 7km per second. At the heart of the satellite is an Ultra High Definition (UHD) camera that captures high-resolution images for any location on Earth – and also films up to two minutes of video at a time as it passes over each target location.

Bangladesh's first satellite, the Bangabandhu-1 communications satellite, is set to be launched on board a SpaceX Falcon-9 space launch vehicle from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on 4 May 2018, according to Mohammed Mezbahuzzaman, project director of the satellite programme.

Japan's Sony Corporation is seeking to enter the New Space sector by manufacturing optical communication devices for small satellites, based on Sony's decades-long experience in manufacturing compact disc (CD) players. This marks a diversification of Sony's business empire, and it is also a strong signal that Japan's great trading houses and companies are looking for opportunities in the New Space sector in Japan and abroad.

SpaceWatch.Global is a proud partner of the Secure World Foundation, and a greateful recipient of SWF support. The SWF published a new report on 11 April 2018 titled Global Counterspace Capabilities: An Open Source Assessment that provides an exhaustive, comprehensive, incisive, and useful open source guide to global counterspace capabilities and developments, as well as analysis of their implications. Here, the authors of that report, Victoria Samson and Brian Weeden, summarise the study and provide a broader geopolitical context about its importance.

A Japanese military satellite payload, DSN-1, a dedicated military communications payload for the Japanese Ministry of Defence (MoD), was successfully launched into orbit on-board a SKY Perfect JSAT Superbird-8 communications satellite by Arianespace on 5 April 2018.

South Korea's Agency for Defense Development (ADD), an agency of the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA), has said that it does not rule out finding another contractor to lead the South Korean reconnaissance satellite programme after current contractor, LIG Nex1, is reported to want to lower the requirement standards for satellite imagery quality and quantity.