SES S.A.

SES S.A.

Type	Société Anonyme
Traded as	LuxSE: SESG, Euronext: SESG
Industry	Telecommunications
Founded	1985
Headquarters	Château de Betzdorf, Betzdorf, Luxembourg
Key people	René Steichen (Chairman), Romain Bausch (President and CEO)
Products	Satellite telecommunications and services
Revenue	€1.736 billion (2010)
Operating income	€797.4 million (2010)
Profit	€487.3 million (2010)
Total assets	€8.229 billion (end 2010)
Total equity	€2.129 billion (end 2010)
Employees	1,578 (FTE, end 2010)
Website	www.ses.com

SES S.A. is a global satellite owner and operator based in Betzdorf, Luxembourg and is listed on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange and Euronext Paris under the ticker symbol SESG. It is a component of the LuxX, CAC Next 20 and Euronext 100 indices.

SES is the world’s second-largest telecommunications satellite operator by revenue and operates a fleet of 49 geostationary satellites able to reach 99% of the World’s population. These satellites provide satellite communication services to businesses and government agencies, and broadcast TV and radio channels to audiences worldwide. As of the end of 2011 SES satellites carry over 5,200 TV channels (including over 1200 in high definition), more than 1000 radio stations, and 44 direct-to-home (DTH) platforms across the world.

Originally founded in 1985 as Société Européenne des Satellites, the company was renamed SES Global in 2001 and in 2006 reverted to SES.

SES is one of the global market leaders of satellite communications services and a pioneer in many important industry developments. SES pioneered DTH transmission, free-to-air broadcast neighbourhoods and co-location of satellites, digital broadcasting, and HDTV. In 2007 SES was named ‘Satellite Operator of the Year’ and CEO, Romain Bausch is the recipient of honours including ‘Satellite Executive of the Year’ in 2002.

Corporate structure

Group structure of SES (Numbers in brackets indicate percentage of participation)

	SES
Major regional participations	Ciel (70%) Quetzsat (49%) Yalive (35%) O3b Networks (34%) Solaris Mobile (50%)
Satellite service companies	SES Government Solutions (100%) Astra Platform Services (100%) Astra Broadband Services (100%) ND SatCom (24.9%) Astra TechCom (100%) HD+ (100%)

Corporate management

In May 2011 SES announced that it was operating under a new "streamlined" management structure to consolidate the then subsidiary companies, SES Astra and SES World Skies under one Executive Committee responsible for running the day-to-day operations as well as for preparing the decisions of the Board of Directors. The SES Executive Committee comprises:

• Romain Bausch - President and CEO
• Andrew Browne - Chief Financial Officer
• Martin Halliwell - Chief Technology Officer
• Ferdinand Kayser - Chief Commercial Officer
• Gerson Souto - Chief Development Officer

SES services

Through its operating companies and participations, SES provides satellite transmission capacity and related services to media broadcasters and businesses, as well for civil government and military communications. SES satellites transmit a variety of formats from radio to High Definition TV, (HDTV) in MPEG-2 and MPEG-4. SES has been a major player in the development of the direct-to-home market in Europe and the cable TV and DBS markets in the U.S..

In Europe, SES pioneered the introduction of HDTV and has been instrumental in defining HDTV standards with the HD ready specification and label. In the U.S., SES provides cable-feed services and HD-PRIME, the U.S.' largest satellite-based HD channel platform. SES has forayed into 3DTV with the recent launches of demonstration channels.

SES also supplies ASTRA2Connect a satellite-based, broadband internet access for maritime and residential users to offer internet access, telephony and TV reception to end users in remote locations where terrestrial broadband services are not available. SES supplies satellite capacity to governments for the delivery of video, internet, voice and data to government agencies.

SES is active in the hosted-payloads market, selling space on planned and under construction satellites to governments and institutions, including the U.S. government, and for the European geostationary navigation overlay system EGNOS a supplementary network to the Galileo navigation system.

History

Early years

SES was formed on the initiative and support of the Luxembourg Government in 1985 as Société Européenne des Satellites (SES). The Luxembourg State remains a major shareholder. In 1988, as Europe’s first private satellite operator, SES launched its first satellite, Astra 1A, to the 19.2° east orbital position. Rupert Murdoch’s Sky TV, along with German broadcasters Pro7, Sat.1, and RTL were among Astra’s first major customers.

By 1990, Astra was broadcasting to 14 million cable and DTH viewers. SES was the pioneer of ‘co-location’ by which several satellites share the same orbital position to provide mutual backup and increase the number of channels available to a fixed receiving dish, creating what became known as a 'satellite neighbourhood'. Astra's prime slot, 19.2° east, saw as many as eight satellites sharing the position simultaneously and helped to build up Astra’s reputation for reliability.

Rapid growth in Germany, in what would become Astra’s largest European market, was helped by the German government’s decision to liberalize the installation of dishes in 1991. In this time SES became the leading satellite system providing direct-to-home transmission, and became the world’s largest satellite platform for TV distribution.

In 1996, after the launch of Astra 1E, SES pioneered digital satellite transmission with the French Canal+. In 1998, SES launched Astra 2A for the UK market, transmitting at the new orbital position 28.2° east, and eventually moving all of its UK and Ireland transmission capacity to this orbital slot.

In the same year, SES went public on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange trading as SESG (in in 2005 SES would also list on the Paris Euronext).

Global expansion

From 1999 SES began a period of ambitious global expansion beyond its European home market. Geographic expansion went hand-in-hand with the diversification of SES’ services beyond just TV broadcasting, to cover telecommunication services for businesses, telecommunications companies and government customers, as well as broadband access and technical consultancy services.

In 1999, SES acquired a 34.13% stake in Hong Kong-based satellite operator AsiaSat and took a foothold in Asia and the Pacific region. A year later, SES acquired 50% of Scandinavian satellite broadcaster Nordic Satellite AB (NSAB), later renamed SES Sirius, which strengthened SES’ coverage in northern and eastern Europe. The same year, SES also took a participation of 19.99% in Brazilian satellite operator Star One, gaining a first presence in Latin America.

In 2001, SES bought 28.75% of Argentina’s Nahuelsat and acquired GE Americom, giving it a solid presence in the important North American market. This resulted in the formation of SES Global, a corporate entity with two operating companies, SES Astra and SES Americom. Altogether, SES operated a fleet of 41 geostationary satellites, the largest in the world in 2001.

Further acquisitions followed. In 2003 SES’ stake in NSAB was increased to 75% and in 2005 SES acquired a participation in Canadian satellite operator Ciel and in Mexico’s QuetzSat, as well as the divestment from Nahuelsat.

SES acquired services provider, Digital Playout Centre GmbH (later Astra Platform Services) in 2005. and in 2006 SES also acquired ND SatCom, a German provider of government services, developing a services portfolio beyond just bandwidth provision.

Also in 2006, SES acquired New Skies Satellites, later renamed SES New Skies, adding six satellites to the SES fleet and strengthening coverage in Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

In 2007 SES divested from its holdings in AsiaSat and Star One in a complex transaction with General Electric which itself divested from SES.

In 2008, SES increased its stake in NSAB to 90%. and merged its two international operating units, SES Americom and SES New Skies into a new segment which was branded SES World Skies in September 2009.

In 2009, SES and Middle East satellite operator Yahsat announced the formation of a joint venture, YahLive to commercialise 23 Ku-band transponders on Yahsat 1A, serving the Middle East, North Africa and South-West Asia with direct-to-home TV services. Also in 2009, SES announced its investment in O3b Networks a project to build a Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellite constellation to deliver high-speed, low-latency, fibre-like internet broadband trunking to the world's emerging regions (“the Other 3 billion”).

In 2010, SES grew its stake in SES Sirius to 100% and closed the acquisition of the in-orbit satellite Protostar-2, renaming it SES-7 and integrating it into its fleet covering India and South East Asia.

Recent events

In May and September 2011, SES restructured and rebranded the company to streamline the organisation’s activities under a single management team and one main brand (SES), incorporating the company’s two previous operating entities, SES Astra and SES World Skies.

In August 2011 the Astra 1N satellite was launched to the Astra 28.2°E orbital position, and in September the QuetzSat 1 satellite was launched to 77°W

See also

• Astra (satellite)
• SES New Skies
• SES Americom
• SES Sirius
• ASTRA2Connect
• ASTRA Platform Services
• Solaris Mobile
• HD+

External links

• Official SES website
• Astra consumer website