AMC-6, formerly GE-6, is a commercial broadcast

communications satellite A communications satellite is an artificial satellite that relays and amplifies radio telecommunication signals via a transponder; it creates a communication channel between a source transmitter and a receiver at different locations on Earth ...

owned by SES S.A. Launched on 21 October 2000, from

Baikonur Cosmodrome ''Baiqoñyr ğaryş ailağy'' rus, Космодром Байконур''Kosmodrom Baykonur'' , image = Baikonur Cosmodrome Soyuz launch pad.jpg , caption = The Baikonur Cosmodrome's "Gagarin's Start" Soyuz ...

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...

, AMC-6 became the fifth hybrid C-band /

Ku-band The Ku band () is the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum in the microwave range of frequencies from 12 to 18 gigahertz (GHz). The symbol is short for "K-under" (originally german: Kurz-unten), because it is the lower part of the ori ...

satellite in the GE Americom fleet. The satellite provides coverage to the continental

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...

, the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean ...

islands, southern

Greenland Greenland ( kl, Kalaallit Nunaat, ; da, Grønland, ) is an island country in North America that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is located between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland ...

, and

Latin America Latin America or * french: Amérique Latine, link=no * ht, Amerik Latin, link=no * pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived ...

. Located in a

geostationary orbit A geostationary orbit, also referred to as a geosynchronous equatorial orbit''Geostationary orbit'' and ''Geosynchronous (equatorial) orbit'' are used somewhat interchangeably in sources. (GEO), is a circular geosynchronous orbit in altitu ...

parallel to the eastern United States coastline, AMC-6 provides service to commercial and government customers, and is used as an

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, p ...

platform due to its wide coverage, scale and redundancy. Some of its capabilities include

Very-small-aperture terminal A very-small-aperture terminal (VSAT) is a two-way satellite ground station with a dish antenna that is smaller than 3.8 meters. The majority of VSAT antennas range from 75 cm to 1.2 m. Bit rates, in most cases, range from 4 kbit/s up to 1 ...

(VSAT) networking,

satellite news gathering Electronic news-gathering (ENG) or electronic journalism (EJ) is usage of electronic video and audio technologies by reporters to gather and present news instead of using film cameras. The term was coined during the rise of videotape technol ...

and Ku-band transceiver service. Launched as GE-6, it was renamed AMC-6 when SES took over GE Americom in 2001, forming

SES Americom SES Americom was a major commercial satellite operator of North American geosynchronous satellites based in the United States. The company started as RCA Americom in 1975 before being bought by General Electric in 1986 and then later acquired b ...

. This merged with

SES New Skies SES World Skies was a short lived company formed as a result of the merger between the two SES subsidiaries, ''SES Americom'' and ''SES New Skies''. The company was merged into its parent company, SES S.A. in 2011. History SES Americom ...

in 2009 to form SES World Skies.

Rainbow 2

Rainbow Media AMC Networks Inc. is an American entertainment company headquartered in 11 Penn Plaza, New York. AMC Networks owns and operates the eponymous cable channel and its siblings, IFC, We TV, and Sundance TV; the art house movie theater IFC Cen ...

announced in November 2004, that it will utilize 16 transponders on the AMC-6 satellite, which

VOOM Voom HD Networks is a suite of 25 original high-definition television channels owned by AMC Networks. The channels were produced in Crystal Clear Hi-Definition with Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and were the largest suite of HD channels in ...

refers to as Rainbow 2.

References

External links

AMC-6 website
* * * {{Orbital launches in 2000 Communications satellites in geostationary orbit Satellite television Spacecraft launched in 2000 SES satellites AMC-06