Telecom 1 - A national communication satellite for domestic and business services

The French Telecom 1 satellite telecommunications project and the services to be provided by it are surveyed. Telecom 1 will comprise operational and spare satellites located in GEO at 4 and 7 deg W and operating in the 14/12 and 6/4-GHz bands, permanent receive-transmit stations for business data and telephone links, and both permanent receive-only and portable transmit-only stations for video-transmission services. The satellite communications payload includes six 36-MHz 20-W TWT transponders for either video or data transmission at 14/12 GHz and four 6/4-GHz transponders for telephone and video service to the Caribbean and Indian Ocean departments. A demand-assignment TDMA system provides data transmission at 2.4 kbit/s to 2 Mbit/s with nonpermanent links and variable network structure.