Eurostar E1000 The original Eurostar E1000 satellite was designed for the Inmarsat-2 fleet requirements by an international team led by
Matra Marconi Space and
British Aerospace Space Systems (BAe Dynamics), the former of which would ultimately acquire BAe Dynamics to eventually become
Astrium and eventually merge with
Airbus Military to form the present Airbus Defence and Space. Three-axis stabilized, and designed for a 10-year service life, the Inmarsat-2 had 4 (+2)
L-band transponders and 1 (+1)
C-Band transponders. The satellite featured a launch mass of , however, the satellite bus was designed to weigh up to to accommodate future customer requirements. Subsequently, the spacecraft also came with different payload power options ranging from 1300 W to 3000 W. This degree of customization was the result of a highly modular design that would carry over onto the upgraded variants. A total of four satellites based on the E1000 bus have been built and launched, all of which were for Inmarsat.
Eurostar E2000/E2000+ The Eurostar E2000, which debuted with
France Telecom as the launch customer in December 1991, was a larger and more capable upgrade of the E1000. It was developed from a set of requirements by the
French Space Agency (CNES) and the French
Ministry of Armed Forces via the
Directorate-General for Armaments (DGA). The DGA had decided to repartner with CNES in order to add
X-Band capabilities to the mission to enable the creation of their Syracuse II military ground-based telecommunications network, and to replace and enhance the role of the Syracuse I systems aboard the aging Telecom-1 fleet. The first of the satellites to be launched would be the Telecom 2A. Each of the four Telecom-2 satellites in the constellation had 10 x C-Band transponders, 14 x Ku-Band transponders and 5 x X-Band transponders. Despite the increase in capabilities, the E2000 bus used for Telecom-2 was only slightly heavier than the E1000, with an on-orbit mass of and a dry weight of , however, like its predecessor, was also designed to accommodate larger payloads with a total launch mass of up to , should the customer require it. The E2000’s operational/maneuverability life varied by customer, but ranged from 7 to 10 years. The E2000’s main power comes from two swivelling solar arrays, with later models capable of producing up to 3600W per array, or 6200 W total with an optional array spanning . with Eutesat's Eutelsat W3A payload. Building upon the idea of modularity, the satellite itself can be built with several modules to serve different missions, all based around a common service module, communications module with 1,2, or 3 floors, a chemical or chemical-electric propulsion module, and scalable payload power options. Satellite power can be up to 16 kW (16,000 W) stored in either
NiH2 or
Lithium-Ion batteries. The solar array's wingspan is also scalable, and capable of deploying to be up to wide. The spacecraft's maximum launch mass has increased to , while its telecommunications payload capacity has been increased to up to 120 installed high-power amplifiers/transponders. In 2018, Airbus D&S launched the first
E3000e - a modified E3000 with all-electric propulsion, removing the standard propulsion module and over of excess mass with it. SES-12 for
SES was the first customer for the E3000e in June 2018. At least 48 x E3000 and E3000e satellite busses had been built and launched by the end of 2018. An improved model based on the E3000e called the
Eurostar Neo was announced in 2017, offering electric, hybrid, or chemical propulsion, in addition to a scalable power range of 7 kW to 25 kW. As of 2020, a total of 84 Eurostar satellites had been ordered, with 6 E3000e satellites already in operation. ==Modularity==