Success as the Express AM44 satellite, named after A.S. Popov, has been put into operation at the 11 West regular orbital slot within the satellite constellation of the Russian Satellite Communications Company (RSCC). Orbital tests of the Express AM44 payload are completed positively.
The Express AM44 satellite will replace the Express-A3 satellite, which service life is fully over, and satisfy the customer needs in satellite capacity for both TV & Radio broadcasting and securing other communications services, inclusive telephone, data transmission and broadband Internet. In addition, it will meet special customer requirements.
The Express AM44 is equipped with 27 transponders, including 16 Ku-band transponders, 10 C-band transponders and 1 L-band transponder. The satellite carries four cutting-edge advanced antennas: 2 steerable Ku-band, 1 C-band and 1 L-band antennas providing for coverage of Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and America. The satellite has been developed by ISS Reshetnev in co-operation with Thales Alenia Space (France) and is designed to be operated for 12 years.
The Russian Satellite Communication Company (RSCC) is the Russian state satellite operator whose spacecraft provide a global coverage. RSCC was founded in 1967 and belongs to the 10 largest world satellite operators in terms of satellites and orbital slots. The company possesses the largest satellite constellation in Russia located in the geostationary orbital arc from 14 West to 140 East and cover the whole territory of Russia, CIS, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific region, North and South America, and Australia. The company includes six Satellite Communications Centers (SCC): Dubna, Bear Lakes, Vladimir, Skolkovo, Zheleznogorsk, Khabarovsk and the Shabolovka Technical Center in Moscow as well as its own high-speed optical-fiber digital network.
As the national satellite operator RSCC meets the important state tasks on providing mobile presidential and governmental communications, federal TV & Radio signal transmission over the territory of Russia and the most countries of the world. The company pays serious attention to implementing national projects. RSCC closely interacts with the Russian state authorities in the field of informational and telecommunications and broadcast systems development. RSCC provides a full range of communications and broadcasting services using its own terrestrial engineering facilities and satellite constellation including up-to-date spacecraft of Express-AM, Express-A, Bonum-1, Ekran-M series and a part of the French W4 satellite capacity. The company’s satellites offer wide opportunities to establish TV & Radio broadcasting inclusive DTH, IPTV, MPEG-4 services, broadband Internet access, data transmission, videoconferencing, VSAT network deployment, departmental and corporative communications networks worldwide. The company has its own satellite TT&C system. At present, RSCC controls and monitors the Eutelsat, ABS, Intelsat satellites using its engineering facilities.
