Bangladesh’s first geostationary communication satellite, Bangabandhu-I, is going to start its maiden commercial operation with broadcasting the South Asian Football Federation (Saff) Championships in September.
To this end, Bangladesh Communication Satellite Company Limited (BCSCL), the organization to manage Bangabandhu-I, has started to install necessary equipment at local satellite television channels, said officials.
BCSCL Chairman, Dr Shahjahan Mahmood, said they have started procedures for broadcasting the Saff Championship using Bangabandhu-I on Bangladesh Television (BTV), reports BSS.
Terming this broadcast a “pre-test” of commercial operation, he said: “All the necessary tests have been completed successfully since the satellite has taken position in orbit. . .Now, the time has come to move ahead.”
About the preparation of local TV channels, Dr Mahmood said BCSCL engineers are working with them to install the necessary equipment.
“Some equipment regarding the satellite connection is needed to be installed for switching over to Bangabandhu-I from other satellites,” said the chairman, adding, “The equipment would be brought by air shipments if required.”
Replying to a query, he said Thales Alenia Space, the manufacturing company of the satellite, is yet to handover control to BCSCL of the two ground stations -the primary one in Gazipur, and the secondary one in Rangamati.
The 12th edition of the Saff Championship, the biennial international men’s football championship of South Asia is organized by Saff, and Bangladesh is hosting it from September 4 to 15.
Bangabandhu-I was successfully launched from historic Launch Complex 39A, at Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on May 11.
According to the agreement, Thales Alenia Space of France will handle the satellite, along with local engineers for the next three years. To this end, an 18-member team of local engineers has been trained.
The government took up the Bangabandhu-I project in May 2015 and assigned Thales Alenia by signing a $248-million deal in November of the same year.
The satellite has 15 years of mission life span with another three years for its design.
The satellite will offer video services for Direct-to-Home (DTH), e-learning, tele-medicine, family planning, farming etc, including voice service to cellular backhaul and disaster recovery, data service for internet, as well as business-to-business VSAT services.
