Overview

Building on our heritage as one of the industry's premier providers of low-Earth orbit satellites, Orbital has firmly established itself as the world's leading supplier of small geosynchronous (GEO) satellites designed to provide direct-to-home TV broadcasting, cable program distribution, business data network capacity, regional mobile communications and similar services.

Orbital's highly successful GEO communications satellites are based on the company's STAR spacecraft platform which provides up to 5 kW of payload power and can accommodate virtually all types of commercial communications payloads.

Orbital entered the GEO satellite market in 1997 with the launch of our first STAR™ spacecraft, IndoStar–1. Since then, Orbital has evolved and improved the STAR platform and has built and launched 12 GEO satellites, and has another 10 in production.

From auspicious beginnings just a decade ago, STAR has become the small GEO communications satellite of choice by leading satellite operators worldwide. Current and past customers include the two largest operators of commercial communications satellites, Intelsat and SES Global, as well as important regional operators such as Optus, Telenor, MEASAT, JSAT, BSAT, PT TELKOM, NTT DoCoMo and IndoVision.

For many applications, the lighter weight, more affordable STAR design is an attractive alternative to the larger, more costly GEO satellites offered by other suppliers. Because Orbital STAR satellites are smaller and significantly less expensive to manufacture and launch, they are an ideal fit for established companies that require incremental capacity for their network or for customers in the early stages of building their business.

The STAR™ Advantage

Business Type	STAR Advantages
Smaller Operations	Small satellites are most economical Best solution for small numbers of transponders
Growing or Emerging Operations	Staged satellite investment conserves capital while allowing for phased-in capacity and faster break-even Multiple satellites mitigate launch and on-orbit risk
Large, Established Operations	Best choice for orbital slots with limited frequency allocation Ideal to fill service gaps Economical complement to existing satellite network capacity Can provide cost effective sparing

Low Earth Orbit (LEO) Communications Networks

Orbital is also a pioneer in low-Earth Orbit communications satellites, having conceived, built and deployed the ORBCOMM network. ORBCOMM was the first global communications network to employ a constellation of LEO satellites. From 1994 -1999 the company built and deployed 35 satellites, integrated five “gateway” ground stations and a network operations center to manage the satellites and process their data.

The narrow-band ORBCOMM network is utilized to send and receive short messages to mobile assets such as trucks, trailers, marine vessels, railcars and other remote assets that are often out of reach of terrestrial communications networks. In 2007, Orbital will deliver six communications subsystems to ORBCOMM, Inc. for the deployment of additional satellites to augment their in-orbit fleet.