Naomi Cooper
Inmarsat‘s latest commercial communications spacecraft launched Friday aboard SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida to provide global coverage to customers starting in 2024.
The Inmarsat-6 F2 satellite is a dual-band network infrastructure that is intended to provide satcom capabilities to both U.S. government and commercial customers through the Orchestra communications network, Inmarsat said Friday.
The spacecraft includes L-band and Ka-band broadband payloads to support government agencies’ intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions.
I-6 F2 will use onboard electric propulsion system to reach its geostationary orbit over the next several months.
“Our I-6 programme has been six years in the making. The I-6 F2 launch marked another milestone as we revolutionise global communications at scale,” Rajeev Suri, CEO of Inmarsat.
Inmarsat’s first I-6 launched in late 2021 aboard Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ H-IIA launch rocket from the JAXA Tanegashima Space Center in Japan.
