Airbus, Telespazio to market Syracuse IV satellites

Airbus and Leonardo-Thales joint venture, Telespazio, have set up a partnership to market military telecommunications services for armed and security forces using the future Syracuse IV satellites.

The services will be offered under a French Defence Procurement Agency (DGA), Airbus, Thales Alenia Space and Telespazio financing initiative, enabling any excess satellite capacity to be sold to third-party customers, bringing down the total cost of ownership of the Syracuse IV system.

The contracts, which will run over a ten-year period, will enable allied countries or organisations to be offered simple, flexible and reactive access to a strategic resource. Airbus and Telespazio will sell Syracuse IV satellite capacity and various high-added-value services such as anchor capacity (connection of satellite communications to the ground networks of third-party customers), end-to-end services with capacity and throughput guarantees, engineering and maintenance services.

These services will be accessible over a broad area ranging from French Guiana to the Straits of Malacca and will be deployed for maritime, terrestrial and air uses. Allied forces will have access to communication capacity in X-band, military Ka-band and X/Ka dual-band mode, offering flexibility while benefiting from the highest levels of protection and hardening provided for in the NATO standards. Units deployed in the field will be able to exchange video, voice and data via all-IP communications at rates of up to several hundred Mbit/s.

Syracuse IV consists of two military satellites, Syracuse 4A and 4B, plus ground stations to ensure communications in the operational areas and with mainland France. The electric-propulsion geostationary satellites are being built by an industrial group consisting of Thales Alenia Space and Airbus, with launch planned for 2022. A third satellite will be added circa 2030 in order to meet growing requirements, in particular the needs of manned and unmanned aircraft.