ViaSat (NASDAQ:VSAT) has received a $50 million contract award from Skylogic, the broadband subsidiary of Eutelsat Communications (Eutelsat Communications-Euronext Paris: ETL), for on-ground baseband infrastructure for the previously announced, high-capacity, KA-SAT Ka-band satellite system. Under the contract, ViaSat will deliver and install broadband equipment for 10 KA-SAT gateways in Europe. The gateways will connect subscribers of Eutelsat Tooway™ satellite broadband service to the Internet. The ViaSat ground infrastructure will be available for the KA-SAT launch scheduled for the third quarter of 2010. ViaSat’s nexgen SurfBeam® Ka-band network is being architected expressly to support very high capacity satellites, such as KA-SAT and ViaSat-1 in North America. These new space systems will deliver more speed and higher volumes of bandwidth at far lower costs than any existing broadband satellite network. The SurfBeam network, which will be exclusively provided to Eutelsat for the KA-SAT coverage areas, exploits the capabilities of the satellite and is designed to deliver much higher speeds (upstream and downstream) to the subscriber, significantly better support for bandwidth-intensive Internet media, and faster web browsing. ViaSat will be the exclusive provider of satellite broadband terminals for the new North American and European satellite systems. The Tooway service operated by Eutelsat broadband subsidiary Skylogic, is already operational today using Eutelsat’s HOT BIRD-6 and Eurobird-3 satellites and the ViaSat SurfBeam networking system. KA-SAT is a high capacity Ka-band spot beam satellite with planned coverage over Europe, the Middle East, and Northern Africa. With a capacity estimated at 70 Gbps, KA-SAT is expected to be (at launch) the highest capacity satellite in the world. KA-SAT is a European counterpart to ViaSat-1, a 100 Gbps Ka-band broadband satellite designed to serve the North American market and with a planned launch in 2011.