Telkom Fill Satellite Orbit Slot 113 ° East Owned By Indosat

Ilustrasi (Image by David Mark from Pixabay)

JAKARTA - The Ministry of Communication and Information Technology handed over an orbit slot located at 113 degrees East Longitude (BT) to PT Telkom Satelit Indonesia (Telkomsat). This slot was previously owned by Indosat.

"Kominfo will then monitor and escort the satellite procurement process which will be carried out by PT Telkom Satelit Indonesia so that the satellite can be placed in the 113 ° East orbit slot before December 31, 2024 in accordance with the time limit set by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU)," he said. Kominfo, in an official statement, Wednesday, January 6.

The orbital slot at 113 BT itself was previously filled by the Palapa D Satellite which serves to serve 23 television and 8 radio broadcasters. The satellite expired in mid-2020.

To replace the Palapa D Satellite, Indonesia actually launched the Nusantara Satellite 2 in April 2020. However, the satellites belonging to Indosat, PT Pasifik Satelit Nusantara (PSN), and PT Pintar Nusantara Sejahtera (PNS) failed to orbit, thus canceling filling the orbit slot 113 ° East.

Telkomsat is expected to fill this orbit no later than December 31, 2024. This is because if it is too late, Indonesia will lose that orbit slot in the future.

"In this regard, the Ministry of Communication and Information has submitted a request for an extension of the validity period of the Indonesian satellite filing in the 113 ° East orbit slot," said Kominfo in its official statement.

Furthermore, Kominfo has evaluated potential new users to fill the Indonesian satellite in the 113 BT orbit slot. Based on the evaluation process that has been carried out, Kominfo has appointed PT Telkom Satelit Indonesia (Telkomsat) as the new user of Indonesian satellite filing in the orbit slot.

So far, Telkomsat has operated the Red and White satellite at the 108 ° East orbit slot, the Telkom 3S satellite in the 118 BT orbit and the Telkom 2 satellite at 157 ° East.

The choice of Telkomsat to hold the satellite slot in orbit 113 BT was also welcomed by the President Director of Telkom, Ririek Adriansyah. Ririek said this decision was a strategic step for the development of the Telkomsat satellite business to strengthen the provision of TelkomGroup satellite infrastructure.

He hopes that this satellite slot can support TelkomGroup in providing connectivity to remote areas and improving quality in serving customers and the people of Indonesia.

"In the future, TelkomGroup through Telkomsat has planned to place a satellite with the latest technology known as High Throughput Satellite (HTS) which is suitable to serve satellite broadband subscribers, covering the C band and Ku band frequency bands in the 113 ° East orbit slot before December 31, 2024. Hopefully this will strengthen Telkomsat's steps to become the leading satellite service provider in the region, "said Ririek in his statement.