Satcoms

Thales Alenia Space, the Joint Venture between Thales (67%) and Leonardo (33%) and Space Systems Loral (SSL), a Maxar Technologies company, have completed an important milestone for the Telesat LEO constellation.

Resolute Mining Limited is revolutionising its operations in Mali by bringing high-speed, low-latency connectivity to its Syama mining site, SES has announced. The fully-managed SES Networks satellite data connectivity solution enables enterprise cloud applications and helps enhance safety and productivity.

A military Earth observation satellite made by several laboratories within India's Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and called MicroSat-R was launched on board an Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) on 24 January 2019 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India.

Thailand's mu Space is heading for the Final Frontier as it announced plans to participate in projects with the U.S. space agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and space exploration initiatives. The announcement, that came during the Pacific Telecommunications Council’s (PTC) conference earlier this week, saw mu Space CEO and Founder James Yenbamroong set out his stall in terms of his future vision for the company.

Arktika-M, the first Russian weather forecasting satellite for monitoring climate and the environment in the Arctic region is planned to be launched into a Molniya orbit in June 2019, according to Russian space industry officials who spoke to Sputnik, a Russian news outlet.

Airbus Defense and Space Inc. has been awarded a contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop a satellite bus in support of the Blackjack program.

Sky and Space Global Ltd. (SAS), the Australian Stock Exchange-listed narrowband satellite communications company, announced on 21 January 2019 that it has signed a Reseller Memorandum of Understanding with Global Telesat SL and a Trial Service Agreement with Telespazio Brasil S/A.

Inmarsat, the world leader in global mobile satellite communications, announced today that its award-winning GX Aviation inflight broadband solution is now available to passengers onboard Indonesian low-cost airline Citilink’s first aircraft.

China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) views space warfare as an important component of its concept of war, and is developing a range of capabilities and tactics to carry out space operations, as well as bolstering its organizational and command and control capacity to enable such operations, according to the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) report China Military Power: Modernizing a Force to Fight and Win, published in January 2019.

Mitsui O.S.K. Lines (MOL), one of Japan’s largest shipping companies, is to increase the roll-out of Inmarsat’s Fleet Xpress Service, across the remainder of its owned and managed fleet. This underlines the confidence placed in the high-speed satellite service by major shipping lines and reinforces the scope of the digital transformation sweeping the industry.