The last of the Eutelsat 2 series spacecraft was modified for direct to home (DTH) broadcastingscheduled for launch in 1995 under the name Hot Bird 1. The satellite will be essentially the same as its predecessors, but the transponder output power will be increased from 50 W to 70 W.
The spacecraft wast procured directly from Aerospatiale and based on the Spacebus-2000 design. It supports 16 transponders (with eight spares) operating at 14/11 GHz and 70 W output power. In orbit the spacecraft spans 22.4 m across the two rectangular solar arrays which generate up to 3.5 kW. Hot Bird 1 employs one, 1.6 m diameter multifeed reflector.
