XTAR announced Wednesday that it has been awarded a contract with the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Telecommunications Service Program Office (DTS-PO), Fairfax, Va., to provide X-band communications services to embassies and consulates in Africa and Asia.
The five-year contract has an estimated maximum value of up to $137 million. XTAR is a joint venture between Loral Space & Communications and HISDESAT.
Bernard L. Schwartz, chairman and CEO, Loral Space & Communications, commented, “XTAR’s agreement with the State Department will provide for the first use of XTAR by the U.S. Government, an important milestone in validating Loral’s innovative investment in XTAR’s commercial X-band service model.
“Through our unique collaboration with HISDESAT, we’re proud to be able to provide the U.S. Government with this new, previously unavailable commercial X-band service in such a critical part of the world.”
“XTAR is designed to offset a portion of the ever growing shortfalls in bandwidth for military and government agency communications by providing a cost-effective commercial augmentation to the government’s X-band satellites,” said Denis Curtin, chief operating officer, XTAR, LLC.
“XTAR will allow DTS-PO to use its currently installed X-band terminals, maintain assured communication access and increase the system’s performance through the powerful XTAR-EUR satellite.”
The Diplomatic Telecommunications Service provides communications services for U.S. Government activities at diplomatic and consular missions worldwide.
The DTS Network provides responsive, reliable, secure, and cost-effective telecommunications services to users at more than 260 sites around the world, representing nearly 50 U.S. Government entities.
Built by Space Systems/Loral (SS/L), XTAR-EUR was launched in February 2005 aboard an Ariane 5 ECA rocket.
Located at 29 degrees East longitude, the satellite carries twelve 72 Mhz high-power X-band transponders that provide coverage from Eastern Brazil and the Atlantic Ocean, across all of Europe, Africa and the Middle East to as far east as Singapore.
XTAR-EUR is expected to provide service for nearly 20 years.
The XTAR-EUR satellite features traditional global beams as well as on-board switching and multiple steerable beams, allowing users access to X-band capacity as they travel anywhere within the footprint of the satellite.
XTAR-EUR is designed to work with existing X-band terminals, as well as next generation X-band terminals that feature antennas smaller than 2.4 meters.
