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Indian Space Research Organisation has now lined up the launch of two more satellites -- INSAT-3A and INSAT-3E -- in the next one year, amid plans to meet the country's requirement to have 250 transponders over the current decade.
Speaking soon after the successful launch of INSAT-3C at Kourou in French Guyana early on Wednesday, ISRO Chairman K Kasturirangan said that INSAT-3A is getting into the advanced stage of integration and would be ready by June-July this year.
"INSAT-3E," he said, "is also getting into initial stages of integration and would be ready for a launch by the end of this year or early part of next year."
Kasturirangan sought launch support for these two spacecraft by Arianespace.
Stating that India has an ambitious programme in space, he said the country's requirement in terms of transponders is 'burgeoning'.
India requires 125 transponders in the next three to four years and 250 transponders in the next decade.
"Obviously, we have to create infrastructure (to add transponder capacity)... more number of satellites and more number of launches", he said, and emphasised the need for strengthening and expanding the relationship between ISRO and Arianespace.
Meanwhile, ISRO sources said the space agency is also trying to sell INSAT capacity to neighbouring countries.
An ISRO official in Bangalore said that the 104-nation Washington based consortium, Intelsat, might require some back up from INSAT-3C, noting that more than half of INSAT-2E capacity had been sold out to it.
ISRO presently has around 80 transponders.
They said ISRO has planned to launch its first fourth generation satellite -- INSAT-4A -- by the end of next year.
Most of the INSAT-4 series would carry KU-band transponders.
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