Nordic Satellite AB (NSAB) has awarded a contract in early January 2005 to Lockheed
Martin to design and manufacture the Sirius 4 satellite.
Sirius 4 will be a multi-mission Ku/Ka-band satellite to be built on Lockheed Martin's
reliable A2100AXS platform with a minimum
service life of 15 years. The spacecraft will be designed to be compatible with all
flight-proven commercial launch vehicles and NSAB intends to select the respective launch
service provider later on in the year. The satellite will be deployed at NSAB's orbital
position of 5° East in the second quarter of 2007.
The first mission of Sirius 4 will be to provide replacement capacity for NSAB's
existing Sirius 2 and Sirius 3
satellites in the Nordic and Baltic markets as well as to enhance coverage in Eastern
Europe and Russia. This mission is supported by 46 active Ku-band transponders in the BSS
and FSS frequency bands.
As a second mission Sirius 4 will provide one wide beam Ka-Band transponder for
interactive applications in Scandinavia and the Baltic States.
The third mission of Sirius 4 will be to provide a sub-Saharan Africa beam
complementing existing (Astra 2B, AMC 12 (also intially called Astra 4A))
African coverage within the SES GLOBAL fleet. This mission will be supported by a payload
consisting of 6 active Ku-Band transponders and an additional Ka-Band transponder for
inter-connections between Africa and Europe. As the AMC 12 satellite was transferred to New Skies Satellite, the Astra 4A designation has been allocated to the sub-Saharan Africa beam of Sirius 4.
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