Satellite News

Teledyne Technologies Incorporate announced that its subsidiary, Teledyne Brown Engineering, Inc., in Huntsville, Alabama, has been awarded a five year prime contract with a potential total value of US$120.1 million to continue providing dedicated payload operations and integration support for the International Space Station (ISS) and other Marshall Space Flight Center managed missions.

Lockheed Martin has completed the assembly of NASA’s Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft. The orbiter is now undergoing environmental testing at the company’s Space Systems facilities, near Denver, Colorado. MAVEN is the next mission to Mars and will be the first mission devoted to understanding the Martian upper atmosphere.

A UK mission, jointly developed by the University of Surrey’s Surrey Space Centre (SSC) and Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL), to send the world’s first smartphone satellite into orbit, is due to launch on 25 February.

Rocket: Ariane 5 ECA; Payload: Amazonas-3, Azerspace/Africasat-1a; Date: 7 February 2013, 2136 UTC; Launch site: Kourou, French Guiana. Ariane 5 deployed its passengers on a successful mission lasting just under 37 minutes.

With Europe’s next fleet of meteorological satellites under development, a ceremony held today in Italy was an important milestone: the signature of an industrial contract for the provision of four novel lightning imagers.

Arabsat announced that it has signed an agreement with the Hellenic Telecommunication Organisation (“OTE”), one of the largest telecom groups in South Eastern Europe, for the acquisition of its 99.05% equity participation in Hellas-Sat Consortium Ltd (“Hellas Sat”).

The Board of Directors of Eutelsat Communications approved the financial results for the half-year ending 31 December 2012.

ViaSat Inc. announced financial results for the third quarter of fiscal year 2013.