OTTAWA – Telesat said Tuesday that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with U.S. aerospace and defense company General Dynamics Mission Systems that will see the two organizations work together to develop user terminals for government and commercial customers who make Telesat’s Low Earth Orbit (LEO) a core component in their communications infrastructure.
Telesat LEO is designed to deliver low latency, fibre-like broadband for commercial and government customers. The initial constellation will consist of approximately 120 state-of-the-art satellites providing full global coverage, and the Canadian satellite company said that it is evaluating options to expand its system beyond this initial configuration.
In this MOU, General Dynamics will draw upon its experience in designing, building and operating satellite ground systems for the Department of Defense, NASA and other government agencies, continued the news release.
Telesat’s government services GM Don Brown said that Telesat’s LEO system will provide government users with unprecedented communications speed and resiliency anywhere on the globe to fulfill their missions.
“We are very pleased to have signed this MOU with General Dynamics Mission Systems, the first company collaborating on the development of Telesat’s LEO constellation that specializes in government markets”, said Brown, in the release. “Combining their deep knowledge of government customer requirements with the innovations of Telesat’s LEO system will enable each of our companies to deliver a new generation of government communications capabilities.”
“General Dynamics Mission Systems has achieved success by providing our government customers with innovative solutions that give them important operational advantages,” added Manny Mora, a vice-president and general manager of General Dynamics Mission Systems. “Our customers increasingly require global communications networks that deliver high levels of resiliency, scalability, security and speed. We look forward to working closely with the experts at Telesat and bringing our customers new communications advances that they can rely on now and in decades to come.”
