EchoStar, the U.S. pay-TV operator on Feb. 21 announced both a satellite launch and a major international investment.

The company plans to launch with International Launch Services (ILS) a satellite in 2008 on a Proton Breeze-M vehicle built by ILS partner Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center of Russia. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. The Proton launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

Also, EchoStar revealed that it is investing $40 million in TU Media Corp., South Korea’s sole operator of satellite digital multimedia broadcasting (S-DMB) services, with more than 1 million subscribers. The move makes EchoStar the second-largest shareholder of TU Media, behind SK Telecom Co. Ltd., a leading mobile operator in Korea.

In a third announcement, EchoStar’s subsidiary EchoStar Fixed Satellite Services Corp. has entered into a long-term contract to provide Artel with multiple satellite transponders to provide fixed satellite service for the Department of Defense (DOD).