SES taps fleet to restore AMC-9 capacity losses
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Editor
| 28 June 2017

Aiming to both restore and to reassure, satellite operator SES has drawn on its fleet to re-establish customer capacity following what it calls a ‘significant anomaly’ affecting services from its AMC-9 satellite on 17 June.

How much capacity was being used, and lost, by the craft at the time of the problem has yet to be revealed. However, SES expects the incident to cause a one-off impairment charge of €38 million, but believes that the potential impact on its full year 2017 group revenue will be lower than €20 million. This includes the potential reduction in available fleet transponders for future commercialisation.

During the incident, the satellite was delivering services to TV programmers, government organisations and other companies across the US and Mexico. One such firm which had contracted capacity on the ACM-9 was Mexico’s Televisa, which was using three C-band transponders to broadcast Canal 2, Canal 5 and Canal 9 over the past two years.

SES says that it engaged with customers immediately after recognising the incident and was able to offer a restoration capacity plan to transfer services to alternative satellites and minimise disruption. It added that by late evening on 18 June 2017, most traffic had already been restored after adjusting its fleet deployment plan and offering solutions to affected customers with the use of existing assets. SES is currently taking steps to relocate additional assets to 83° West to support customers’ requirements.

“SES wishes to thank all of its affected customers for their understanding and cooperation. In addition, SES wishes to thank the FCC for its support over the weekend, by providing the necessary approvals to help put in effect the needed solutions” said Martin Halliwell, SES chief technology officer. “Beyond AMC-9 status, SES continues to work towards a long-term plan of capacity replacement.”

SES is still working with the manufacturer to identify the root cause of the anomaly, as well as any possible options to recover the spacecraft.