Satmex’s most recent challenges, however, is meeting present demand in Mexico, as the company only has about five percent of capacity on its fleet left to sell.

    While its new spacecraft Satmex-8 may alleviate some of the operator’s capacity issues, the design process for another satellite is already underway. Satmex Vice President of Business Development Clemente Cabello spoke with Via Satellite about the operator’s plans to bounce back in other countries in the region with a number of new satellites planned.

 

 

Cabello: Our satellites are 95 percent full. Right now, in C and Ku-band, there is more demand than we can actually manage. We are launching our Satmex-8 satellite next year to replace Satmex-5. The new satellite will have 45 percent more capacity than its predecessor. We expect to have around 70 percent of capacity sold on this satellite by the time it launches.

 

 

Cabello: We have three orbital slots. All but one of these orbital slots are occupied by our satellites. We are planning to launch a new satellite for that orbital slot. This new satellite will be called Satmex-7 and we expect to launch that in the next few years. It will be just one satellite. We are in the design process for Satmex-7 and it will have at least 60 transponders. It is shaping up to be a big satellite.

 

 

Cabello: We are in the final stages of completing the financial restructuring of our company, which will provide us with the cash to fund new satellites and future satellite programs. So, we are very excited about this. We do not, however, expect to see revenue and profit growth in 2011 compared to 2010.

 

 

Cabello: We are seeing the most growth in South America. We have excellent coverage of the Pacific countries in Latin America, like Colombia, Peru, and Ecuador etc. These are countries that are seeing their economies grow significantly and their telecommunication needs growing significantly. Most of the growth we have seen has been from those countries, and we continue to expect that. There is more growth here than there is in Mexico.

             

 

Cabello: I think there is at least one company (in the region) that is looking into being a service provider (for Ka-band). It is a company that already offers Internet, telephony and television services. They are already looking at the possibility of purchasing Ka-band satellite capacity. I think it will take a few years, but I believe that Ka-band is definitely coming to Latin America. We will definitely be a part of it when it arrives in the 2014-2015 timeframe.