RapidTVNews reports that Nilesat has ordered its next-generation satellite, from Thales Alenia space, and with Arianespace as its launcher. The satellite will be Nilesat’s largest will equipped with Ka-band transmission. 

Salah Hamza, chief technology officer of Nilesat, said: “The build of Nilesat 201 has already started, with Thales Alenia. Thales was successful in its bid at the end of the day, and additionally benefited over satellite builders like Orbital Science because of our need for the satellite to carry four Ka-band as well as 24 Ku-band transponders. Ariane will launch the satellite, and the plan is to launch around May 2010.”

The date is longer off than Nilesat had first planned, especially given that its own capacity is long-exhausted, and there is only one full transponder on its leased Eutelsat craft yet to be illuminated. Indeed, its is likely that Eutelsat, with Nilesat’s full blessing, will move its old Hot Bird 3 satellite to a co-located position with Nilesat 101 and 102 in order to guarantee continuity of service. Hamza was visiting Paris today, June 3, for these and other discussions with Eutelsat.

Hamza, speaking at the Arab Advisors Group media and telecoms conference in Amman, said pay-TV operations in the Middle East were struggling to make headway locally. He said with the proliferation of free-to-air channels in the Arab world, with many now showing first-run movies and American series, as well as high-quality sports, it was increasingly difficult for pay-TV channels to make any positive progress. “MBC2 is now offering first showings of material that up until recently you would only have seen on pay-TV,” he said.

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