[Satellite News 08-12-10] Eutelsat, which has launched five satellites in the last three years, is preparing for a period of high activity over the next three years, with seven new satellites to be launched by early 2013.
    Eutelsat CEO Michael de Rosen told Satellite News that after 2013, the operator’s fleet will be among the youngest in the sector and its overall capacity will increase 25 percent. “Transponder capacity on our fleet has increased in recent years with the launch of bigger and more powerful satellites, so we now have a more robust and modern fleet. We have also initiated some other projects that will take us even further into the future from a technology standpoint. Our goal is to deliver good and robust growth, year after year, over the long term. The guidance we have given the market is to grow our revenues by over 7 percent a year for the next three years. This is consistent with our increase in capacity of around 25 percent for the same period.”
    One of the major challenges facing the FSS operator during its fleet build-up, according to de Rosen, will be access to competitively priced launch services. “We have seen in the last six months a period without a launch incident. This is good for everybody in our industry; for our customers also, and we hope this continues. Over the last six months, the launcher market has remained strong with a large number of launches having taken place, so the industry is currently quite vibrant. … Sea Launch coming out of Chapter 11 is good news for our industry. Competition is good for everybody. It increases the quality of service to satellite operators. We have not seen any significant movement to the commercial market from Atlas and Delta, so we are not counting on them being available to the non-military market over the next few years.”
    While Eutelsat’s latest full-year results showed growth in overall profits and revenues, de Rosen said he is not getting carried away. His business model focuses on long-term, gradual build-up and sustained growth. “Eutelsat is a marathon runner, not a sprinter, and we are about sustainability. We do not aim to be a Usain Bolt. Compared to a year ago, we have a much stronger balance sheet. Both Moody’s and Standard and Poors upgraded Eutelsat to investment-grade, which allowed us to tap the bond market for the first time last March. We refinanced a significant part of our debt, and the result is both a better balance from financing sources and a much improved debt maturity profile. We also have expanded the fleet, improved the balance sheet, strengthened the talent pool of the company and increased the backlog now giving us visibility of four-to-seven years of revenues,” he said.
    After signing a deal with IctQatar earlier this summer to jointly own and operate a satellite, de Rosen says Eutelsat could look for other interesting partnership deals going forward. “You should not be surprised to see us do condominium-type deals in the future. To do this, there obviously has to be a lot of trust between the partners. Because of our historical ties with other players and because of our good reputation, opportunities often come to us. We don’t want to do a deal just for the sake of it. It is like a marriage that will last over the long term. We look carefully at all opportunities, not just in economic terms, but also in terms of a good fit. But I would just like to underscore that we don’t have to do partnership deals to be successful, so we will do them only if they create value for our company."