The Regional African Satellite Communication Organization (RASCOM) will provide telecommunication services, direct TV broadcast services and Internet access in rural areas of Africa. Under an agreement with RASCOM, RascomStar-QAF (a private company registered in

Mauritius Mauritius ( ; french: Maurice, link=no ; mfe, label=Mauritian Creole, Moris ), officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about off the southeast coast of the African continent, east of Madagascar. It incl ...

) will implement RASCOM's first 14

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. C ...

project. This joint African project is expected to lower the continent's dependency on international satellite networks such as

Intelsat Intelsat S.A. (formerly INTEL-SAT, INTELSAT, Intelsat) is a multinational satellite services provider with corporate headquarters in Luxembourg and administrative headquarters in Tysons Corner, Virginia, United States. Originally formed as In ...

RASCOM-QAF1

RASCOM-QAF1 is the first satellite entirely dedicated to the African continent.

Thales Alenia Space Thales Alenia Space () is a Franco-Italian aerospace manufacturer. A joint venture between the French technology corporation Thales Group (67%) and Italian defense conglomerate Leonardo (33%), the company is the largest satellite manufacture ...

built the satellite in the

Cannes Mandelieu Space Center The Cannes Mandelieu Space Center is an industrial plant dedicated to spacecraft manufacturing, located in both the towns of Cannes and Mandelieu in France. After a long history in aircraft manufacturing, starting in 1929, the center became increa ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

. The company has delivered the satellite in-orbit, and will supply the ground infrastructure needed to operate it. The spacecraft is based on the Spacebus 4000B3 platform, with a payload of twelve Ku-band transponders and eight C-band transponders. It weighed about at launch. Launch aboard an Ariane 5GS rocket took place on 2007-12-21. On 2007-12-29 Thales Alenia Space announced that a helium leak aboard the spacecraft would delay its activation. On 2008-01-08 the company announced the perigee of the satellite's orbit would be raised, and also acknowledged that if the satellite eventually reached geostationary orbit its useful lifetime would be significantly reduced. On 2008-02-04 Thales Alenia Space announced the satellite had reached its intended geostationary orbit at 2.85° East. They expect its lifetime to be slightly over 2 years.

RASCOM-QAF1R

On 2008-09-09 Thales Alenia Space announced it would supply RASCOMSTAR-QAF with a new satellite which will provide continuity of service for RASCOMSTAR-QAF customers. Like RASCOM-QAF1, RASCOM-QAF1R will be based on the Spacebus 4000 B3 platform and will be fitted with twelve Ku-band and eight C-band transponders. Launch aboard an

Ariane 5 Ariane 5 is a European heavy-lift space launch vehicle developed and operated by Arianespace for the European Space Agency (ESA). It is launched from the Centre Spatial Guyanais (CSG) in French Guiana. It has been used to deliver payloads int ...

ECA occurred on August 4, 2010.

References

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External links

rascomstar.com
{{Authority control Satellite operators Satellites orbiting Earth First artificial satellites of a country