The European Space Agency (ESA) has awarded a contract for the development of next-generation DVB-S2 satellite multicasting products to the International Datacasting Corp. (IDC) as part of ESA’s "Telecom Start-up Project Initiative," where ESA plays an investment role by supporting the development of new satellite systems and technologies in preparation for future services.

The objective of the project is to plan and develop an extension of IDC’s DVB-S2 product line capable of reaching ultra-high throughput performance and multi-carrier operation. The project will build on IDC’s recently released DVB-S2 line of receivers aiming to provide a variety of point-to-multipoint broadband datacasting applications that include IPTV, digital cinema, digital radio networks, syndicated television and HDTV.