Passage To Launch For Australia's First Independent Next Gen Satellite Jabiru-1

Jabiru Explained - Passage to Launch Date for Australia's First Independent Next Generation Satellite

Australia's leading independent Satellite Communications Company, NewSat Limited (ASX: NWT), is pleased to provide an update on the passage to launch of Australia's first Independent Next Generation Satellite program.

In January, NewSat met with the Presidents and CEOs of the most active and prestigious international space companies. The Company's ambition to launch Jabiru-1, which will cover Australia, South East Asia, the Middle East and sectors of Africa, is well qualified and eagerly anticipated by NewSat's international counterparts.

This international acceptance and recognition provides further confidence in NewSat's initiative to launch Jabiru-1 as a stunning precursor to the National Broadband Network (NBN) satellite developments in the final quarter of 2012.

With access to a number of orbital satellite slots and over two years of developmental research including working with insurers to ensure sufficient underwriting, NewSat understands satellite and space better than any other Australian owned organisation and will unveil its complete strategy before June 30th 2010.

Almost five years ago NewSat acquired the teleport assets from Dutch owned NewSkies and in doing so initiated a worldwide growth opportunity to undertake Telemetry, tracking and Control (TT & C) for numerous organisations who owned satellites. As an independent monitoring entity, NewSat has grown its business substantially and built a solid, worldwide reputation for quality and dependability. NewSat will undertake the TT & C for Jabiru and will also be the sales and marketing arm for the satellite, as its reason for creating Jabiru was to provide for its future. Jabiru-1 is forecast to have a minimum of 50 per cent of transponders pre-sold by June 30th. This is of significant appeal to equity partners and funding organisations, many of whom have been working with Jabiru for over 12 months.

In commenting on this exciting phase of the Company's development for NewSat, Adrian Ballintine, Chief Executive Officer said,

"Revenues from the first satellite are envisaged to be in excess of $1.5 billion and profits in the hundreds of millions over the 15 year life of the satellite. This is a very exciting time for NewSat shareholders and we look forward to updating the market with achievements as they progress and ultimately our complete strategy on or before June 30th."

For further information contact Rod North, Bourse Communications on (03) 9510 8309 or 0408 670 706.

SOURCE: NewSat