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China to Make Second Attempt at Launching DTH Satellite |
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BEIJING, China, March 19, 2007/Satnews Daily/ ― China will again try to go full speed ahead with direct-to-home (DTH) television with the launch of ChinaSat-9 in September or October. China’s first DTH satellite, SinoSat-2 failed after one of its solar panels failed to deploy properly. SinoSat-2 was launched in November 2006.
Chinasat-9 or Zhongxing 9 (ZX 9) will provide DTH services to areas that are home to 98 percent of China's population. It is meant to be the stable mate of the failed Sinosat-2, China’s first DTH satellite. Both SinoSat- 2 and ChinaSat-9 will share the same orbit. SinoSat-3, China’s third DTH satellite, is to launch this May, while the replacement for SinoSat-2 will take at least three years to build and launch.
ChinaSat-9, based on the Spacebus 4000 C1 platform, will be fitted with 22 active Ku band transponders for broadcast satellite services, including eighteen 36 MHz and four 54 MHz channels. ChinaSat-9 will weigh about 4,500 kilograms at liftoff. Positioned at 92.2° East, it has a design life of more than 15 years.
A Chinese Long March rocket will launch it from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan province. Alcatel Space will be in charge of the launch campaign, orbital positioning, in-orbit tests and delivery of a satellite simulator.
China has one of the world's biggest TV markets, with 400 million sets and 13 million digital TV subscribers. Even charging a minimum of $0.12 (1 yuan) per channel for one family, DTH is expected to generate revenues of at least $1.8 billion each year between 2008 and 2017, according to the government. China now rents 37 transponders on 12 foreign-made satellites for broadcasting services.
In June 2004, Alcatel Space signed a $145 million contract with China Satellite Communication Corporation (ChinaSat) to design and produce the new-generation communications satellite, ChinaSat- 9. This DTH satellite will make ChinaSat to be the first state-owned Chinese company to provide satellite broadcast services in China. The deal was an example of a European company profiting from U.S. government technology-transfer restrictions to China.
Since 1998, U.S. government restrictions on satellite sales to China have tightened into a de facto refusal by the U.S. government to permit satellites with U.S. components from being delivered to Chinese organizations if the satellites are to be launched on Chinese Long March rockets.
These restrictions made it all but impossible for any U.S. contractor to bid on the ChinaSat contract. The same restrictions made it difficult for Alcatel Space’s chief European competitor, EADS Astrium, to bid on ChinaSat. Astrium uses U.S. components in its satellites. Loral Space and Communications has been trying for six years to receive U.S. government approval to deliver the Chinasat-8 satellite, without success. The satellite, which was completed in December 1998, has been in storage at Loral’s Palo Alto, California satellite plant ever since.
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