Asia must seriously consider increasing regional cooperation in the satellite realm. Joint satellite-based projects involving disaster response and emergency management, especially in light of the latest earthquake in the region, would be a good place to start.

In late 2005, Bangladesh, China, Indonesia, Iran, Mongolia, Pakistan, Peru and Thailand joined the Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Organization (APSCO). However, China and Japan should be sharing the lead roles.

Both countries are upgrading their emergency management and disaster response networks with satellites playing an important role. China is increasing its fleet of Earth observation and environmental monitoring mini-satellites and also is preparing a new state-of-the-art satellite-based emergency operations center. Japan is taking steps in the same direction. But the two countries playing a lead role in APSCO is not likely under the organization’s current framework.

If Europe can create and sustain a viable multinational space agency to compete more effectively with the United States and Russia, Asia can as well. And enhancing Asia’s ability to cope with large-scale disasters while helping to defuse regional tensions are good reasons for doing so.

Improved cooperation also could provide immediate benefits in the wake of the loss of China’s SinoSat-2 in October. The failure is not just a setback to Chinese initiatives in DBS programming and expanded broadband services but also has impacted the ability of the government to issue alerts and warnings to its large rural population in advance of weather-related disasters.

Meanwhile, in mid-December, a Japanese experimental S-band satellite, Engineering Test Satellite-8 (Kiku-8) was launched. Kiku-8 is designed to play a major role in Japan’s disaster response plans, among other things.

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) goals for Kiku-8 are to “support development, experimentation and confirmation of large satellite bus technology, large-scale deployable antenna technology, mobile satellite communications system technology, mobile satellite digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB) system technology and basic positioning technology using high-accuracy time standard devices.”

“There is much room to improve services, for example, miniaturization of hand-held terminals, improvement of image-quality or sound quality, speeding-up of transmission. To realize that, it (was) necessary to develop (Kiku-8’s) larger antenna reflector and higher power (S-band) transponder,” says a JAXA spokesperson.

There is plenty of improvement needed when it comes to beaming instantaneous alerts and warning throughout Asia to portable devices, too.

Kiku-8 also will help in the further refinement of commercial multimedia services. DMB via satellite (DMB-S) services have been available in Japan since 2004 via Mobile Broadcasting Corp.’s Mobaho! services, and more than 800,000 subscribers in South Korea now get their DMB-S service off the same satellite via TU Media, a Korean service provider.

China no doubt is watching Kiku-8 closely. China wants DMB-S to happen sooner rather than later, especially with the 2008 Olympics right around the corner. At the same time, Japan continues to spend huge sums to develop and stabilize its H-2A launch program in direct competition with the Chinese Long March rockets as well as with established launch services offered by other nations. India is on the list, and South Korea may soon be on it as well China and Japan could benefit enormously from joint satellite projects starting with a Sino-Japanese satellite-based disaster management project. It makes sense and would be a positive step in the right direction.

APSCO is not getting the job done, while serious discussions which synchronize the efforts of both countries in this regard are long overdue. Such a partnership would lay the foundation for a broader regional effort that would speed the creation of a viable multinational satellite consortium in Asia.

Finally, as 2007 gets underway, there is anticipation of a possible merger in the North American satellite radio market. If it happens, the new combined DARS entity that emerges will be awash in S-band satellite capacity. One way to instantly raise revenue would be to sell off one or two S-band satellites. Is there a potential customer out there? Try looking for one in Asia, and in Beijing in particular.