French defence procurement agency DGA (Direction Générale de l’Armement) has awarded Thales Alenia Space a design contract to study military space communications capacity to be available by 2019. This study falls within the scope of preparations for the replacement of two Syracuse III satellites built by Thales Alenia Space, and as a complement to the two satellites Sicral 2 and Athena Fidus, also developed by Thales Alenia Space and built in cooperation with Italy.

Building on its unrivaled heritage in space communications for security and defence, Thales Alenia Space will submit to the French Ministry of Defense in the coming months its analysis of the military satellite communications (milsatcom) capacity needed in orbit, acquisition procedures and collaboration schemes. Working with the French and Italian ministries of defence and space agencies, Thales Alenia Space was the industrial partner that enabled the first and still only two collaborative European programmes on space communications for security and defence.

Replacing this capacity entails major challenges: strategic challenges in terms of security and defence, a facet of national sovereignty; operational challenges because of the indispensable nature of milsatcom capacity for foreign deployments of armed forces; and economic challenges, given the context of the economic crisis and budget cuts.

Thales Alenia Space was chosen once again to participate in this major programme because of its proven skills and expertise in the production of communications satellites (operating in the X, Ka and other bands), and the construction of large-scale systems.