The SES-17 satellite was successfully launched onboard an Ariane 5 launcher operated by Arianespace from the Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.
From its orbital slot of 67.1 degrees West orbital slot, the very high throughput geostationary (GEO) SES-17 Ka-band satellite offers nearly 200 user beams that can be connected to any other beam at any time across the Americas, the Caribbean and the Atlantic Ocean. The satellite is capable of dynamically changing the power and frequency allocation of any beam. It is also the first GEO satellite to use Adaptive Resource Control (ARC), an industry-first software system that leverages the full flexibility of totally digital payloads to autonomously adapt space and ground resources on the fly to meet customer needs.
Equipped with an all-electric propulsion system, the satellite will reach orbit as of mid-2022. When operational, anchor customer Thales InFlyt Experience will use SES-17’s connectivity to power its next-generation aviation connectivity solution, FlytLIVE.
“We are immensely excited to have SES-17 join our GEO fleet and medium earth orbit (MEO) constellation. SES-17 is the fruit of a successful collaboration between the Thales Group, Thales Alenia Space and SES, and will enable us to address the exponential connectivity demands in aviation and maritime, and to accelerate digital inclusion initiatives across the Americas,” said Steve Collar, CEO of SES. “Thanks to Arianespace, SES-17 is now on its way to orbit. We are looking forward to SES customers being able to leverage the high throughput, global reach and low-latency of SES’s multi-orbit, interoperable Ka-band satellite network comprising SES-17 and our upcoming O3b mPOWER constellation.”
