System Design Aspects of Ka-Band High Throughput Satellite (HTS) for Indian Region

In the era of advanced communication technology, there is an ever-increasing demand for providing user-specific broadband content to a large population. Though ground infrastructure is directed towards supporting the high bandwidth needs in developed regions, the remote and isolated areas remain devoid of such services. This has led to the evolution of High Throughput Satellite (HTS) systems to deliver uniform broadband connectivity to the developed as well as the unconnected and remote regions. HTS supports a vast range of user requirements like video-on-demand, high data rate corporate links, content distribution/back-haul links from small user terminals. These satellites are capable of providing large system throughput as compared to the conventional Fixed Satellite Service (FSS) and Broadcast Satellite Service (BSS) satellites due to the use of multi-beam architecture and large system bandwidths. In this paper, the concept, design and features of a High throughput satellite system are discussed and the payload configuration for a geostationary Ka-band HTS over Indian region is presented. With 1 GHz of total user spectrum in forward as well as return links, the Indian Ka-band High Throughput Satellite will provide ~ 80 Gbps of overall throughput with 72 spot beams over India.