Thailand's Shin Satellite has reached an agreement with China Satcom to cooperate in order to launch iPSTAR broadband services in China.
The first iPSTAR gateway in Beijing will be available for service in May 2006. Additional iPSTAR gateways will later be available in Shanghai and Guangzhou.
There are currently about 64 million broadband users in the China market and this is expected to reach 100 million. Shin Satellite expects iPSTAR to attract about one million users in total.
China Satcom was set up as part of the Chinese government's industry plan to extend satellite services to the country. The company includes several enterprises, China Telecommunications Broadband Satellite Corporation, China Orient Telecommunications Satellite Co. Ltd., China Space Mobile Satellite Communication Co. Ltd., China Post & Telecommunications Translation Service Corporation and China Telecom (Hong Kong) Chinasat Corporation.
China Satcom expects to offer satellite-based broadband leased lines, or virtual private networks (VPN), various telephony, data and multimedia services for corporate customers, among other high speed services.
Shin satellite launched Thaicom 4 (iPSTAR), the world's largest commercial satellite, in August 2005 to provide the Asia-Pacific region with high-speed Internet access and Internet protocol applications, including voice, data and multimedia.
