New Skies Satellite NV, the private satellite operator already spun off from Intelsat, has contracted with Lockheed Martin Commercial Space Systems for the turnkey construction of its seventh satellite, NSS 6.

The total program cost of $279 million will cover construction of a Lockheed Martin A2100AX satellite, an Arianespace launch, insurance and on-orbit testing, New Skies said.

NSS 6 will be launched aboard an Ariane 4 or 5 in the fourth quarter of 2002 and will be located at 95 degreesE, according to New Skies. The satellite is designed to cover Asia from the eastern Mediterranean to Japan and Korea, providing a wide range of broadband, multimedia services, but also will provide service to southern Africa. It will have six broad Ku-band downlink beams covering China, India, the Middle East (including Cyprus) and Australia, South Africa, Southeast Asia and Northeast Asia, New Skies said.

“The transponder capacity assigned to each beam can be increased or decreased throughout the satellites [14-year] operational lifetime in response to shifts in demand and regulatory considerations. Up to 15 transponders can be assigned to each of the six beams,” the company said.

New Skies has five satellites in operation and a sixth, NSS 7, under construction, also by the Lockheed Martin Commercial Space Systems subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corp. [LMT]. NSS 7 is scheduled for launch late next year and will be stationed at 338.5 degreesE.