By moving its Hot Bird 2 satellite from 13 degrees East to 9 degrees East and renaming it Eurobird 9, Eutelsat hopes to extend the capacity currently available through the Hotbird satellites at 13 degrees East. The Portuguese operator TVTel will soon launch a new, two transponder, 20-channel pay-TV platform catering to the country’s two million analogue terrestrial-only homes. It will act as the launch customer for a new dual-feed, or second lnbf solution introduced by Eutelsat.
However, the new slot is located too close to Eutelsat’s long-established orbital positions 10 and 7 degrees East to allow for single dish reception of the Eurobird 9 and the satellites in these two slots, using multiple LNBs, also known as dual-feed. The spacing required between the two LNBs is simply less than the width of the two receptionheads needed to receive signals from two satellite positions using a single dish.
Eutelsat recently moved Hotbird 3, now renamed to Eurobird 4, to 4 degrees East, a previously unused orbital position. It also moved a satellite alongside Nilesat at 7 degrees West to extend capacity over the Middle East.