AmerHis demonstration at Le Bourget
ESA will have a live demonstration of the capabilities of the AmerHis 'switchboard in space' at the Le Bourget Airshow in Paris, France from 13 to 19 June.
In collaboration with Alcatel Space of France, the demonstration will consist of real time continuous video streaming and a series of scheduled videoconferences with Hispamar in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, EMS in Montreal, Canada and the Espacio and Hispasat facilities in Arganda (Madrid), Spain.
The ESA Transportable Communications Vehicle (TCV) will facilitate the connection. The TCV will be equipped with an AmerHis terminal and located next to the Alcatel Space booth at Le Bourget.
Continuous Video Streaming demonstrations from the three sites mentioned above will take place from 9:30 to 18:00 on Tuesday 14 June to Friday 17 June (demo closes 12:00 on Friday).
Demonstrations of videoconferencing will occur from 16:00 to 16:30 on Tuesday 14 June to Thursday 16 June.
These demonstrations will display the most outstanding features of AmerHis. It can provide broadband real-time services between very distant sites located in different coverage areas using low cost standard DVB-RCS terminals.
AmerHis
Launched in August 2004 and located in a geostationary orbit at 61 degrees west, AmerHis is carried aboard Hispasat's Amazonas satellite and heralds a new era in satellite communications.
AmerHis is the only commercially viable telecommunications satellite with onboard regenerative processing, allowing the provision of services using a 'single-hop' between ground stations, as opposed to using a more ‘two hop’ arrangement with a central ‘hub’ ground station. ‘Single hop’ operation speeds up signal delivery and provides real time video conferencing capabilities to North America, South America and Europe.
Among the benefits to Internet Service Providers (ISPs) will be the ability to manage their own low-cost gateways, in turn providing reliable Internet access to subscribers. Corporate informatics services will also profit. Companies with multiple branch offices will be able to more easily set up their own Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) and share their allocated capacity between all branch offices.
The AmerHis payload works like a switchboard in space, operated by a network control centre on the ground that is able to configure the payload, assign capacity and manage user traffic. In addition, AmerHis supports a wide variety of applications and tele-services from video broadcasting on demand to videoconferencing.
With coverage over all of Latin America, the United States and Canada as well as transatlantic capacity allowing coverage of Europe and northern Africa, the Amazonas satellite is also a prime example of what can be done to bridge the digital divide.
This ambitious project is the product of collaboration between Alcatel Espacio, Mier Communicaciones and Indra Espacio (Spain), Alcatel Space (France), EMS Technology (Canada) and Nera ASA (Norway). It is funded by the European Space Agency (ESA) and supported by the Spanish Centre of the Industrial and Technological Development (CDTI). The international scope of the project represents symbolic cooperation between national agencies, operators and industry.
