"We are continually engaged in an exercise of tracking every satellite, probe, capsule or other orbiting hardware that is proposed to be built and launched worldwide over the next 20 years. But once a year we stop and take a snapshot and publish our findings," said Marco Caceres, lead analyst for Teal Group's World Space Systems Briefing, the 1,400-page monthly-updated competitive intelligence service, which features the Model.

"The Model is itself not a forecast, which is why the numbers are heavily skewed for the period 2009-2011, as we simply have more solid data about the near-term. It is the first step in the process of gauging which space programs are out there and eventually coming up with numbers that reflect the payloads we project will materialize and go to earth orbit."

The 2,033 payloads reflect a 2.5% increase over the 1,981 payloads counted in the Model for the period 2008-2027.

Most of this growth can be attributed to a nearly 7% increase in the number of the civil payloads factored into the Model, based on more available information about scientific and technology satellites planned by the Chinese and Indian national space programs, as well as more all and micro satellites proposed by NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA).

Commercial payloads, which include traditional telecommunications and TV broadcasting, digital radio and direct TV broadcasting, broadband and mobile communications, and earth imaging satellites account for 41% of the payloads in the Model, as compared to 39% for civil payloads, 17% for military, and 3% for university.

In Models released during the 2005-2007 the percentage of commercial payloads relative to other types of payloads steadily declined from 39% to 36.2% to 34.5%.

This trend began to reverse in 2008 and continues in this year's Model, reflecting the dozens of replacement satellites for the Globalstar and Orbcomm low earth orbit (LEO) mobile communications constellations aimed to be launched within the next 2-3 years and the additional dozens of Iridium replacements anticipated by the middle part of the next decade.

There has also been a noticeable pick up during the past three years in orders for new geostationary (GEO) commercial communication satellites. In 2008, at least 24 GEO commercial comsats were ordered.

North America accounts for 40% of the total payloads in the Model; Europe, 22%; Asia and Pacific Rim, 16%; Russia and former states of the Soviet Union, 16%; Africa and Middle East, 3%; and Latin America and Caribbean, 3%. The United States alone accounts for 39% of the payloads.

More than half of all the proposed military payloads are for the US Department of Defense (DoD). Approximately 23% of all the civil payloads are for NASA.

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Lagos, Nigeria (XNA) Mar 27, 2009
Nigeria and China have signed a contract for a new communications satellite that will replace one sidelined by a power failure, a newspaper reported Wednesday.