ABS 2A will cover the growing markets of Russia, India, Middle East, Africa, South East Asia and the Indian Ocean region. Image credit: ABS

ABS 2A will cover the growing markets of Russia, India, Middle East, Africa, South East Asia and the Indian Ocean region, and will follow. With 2.6 GHz of Ku-band spectrum, the satellite nearly doubles the available Ku-band frequencies available at 75 degrees east. Together with ABS 2, the new satellite will deliver a total of 100 x 54MHz Ku-band capacity to this orbital location to a growing list of premium DTH customers, VSAT operators and maritime and mobility customers.

With 7.5kW of payload power, ABS 2A is the second of the four Boeing 702SP all electric satellites that ABS is purchasing from Boeing Satellite Systems International in partnership with Satmex. ABS 2A, along with ABS 3A, is part of the 702SP production line, an all-electric propulsion satellite that minimizes the spacecraft’s mass and maximizes available payload. It will be dual launched with its co-passenger Satmex 9, on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, in the fourth quarter of 2015.

“The next three years will be very exciting for ABS as we are completing a $750 million satellite expansion program delivering three new satellites over the next 36 months,” said Tom Choi, CEO of ABS. “ABS already has over $800 million of backlog and we anticipate this to grow over $1 billion this year. When we deliver ABS 2A to orbit in 2015, we anticipate our annual revenue will more than triple from 2013. The majority of the customers who have confirmed contracts on ABS 2 have already committed to ABS 2A.”