After the launch of Insat 3C, another homegrown satellite gets ready for launch in March this year.

Insat 3A will join the Insat family in space on 19 March. To be launched by Araine 4, the same vehicle that propelled Insat 3C into orbit, Insat 3A was initially scheduled for a 15 March launch, but will be delayed by four days, latest reports say. The satellite will take off from Kourou in French Guiana, the launch pad favoured by Isro‘s partner in the satellite programme, Arianespace.

Meanwhile, Insat 3C, which was launched on 24 January, reached its home in space on 1 February. According to Isro, station acquisition manoeuvres were successfully conducted from MCF, Hassan in the last four days by firing the 10 Newton Reaction Control Thrusters on board to position the satellite precisely at 74 deg East longitude. Inast-3C will be maintained in this location for the rest of its service life, officials say.

In the coming weeks, the payloads comprising 24 C-band transponders, six extended C-band transponders, two S-band transponders and the mobile satellite service transponders will be tested before Insat-3C is commissioned into service by the end of February.

Hinduja TMT Ltd, (HTMT), the holding company in India for the group‘s information technology, media and telecommunications assets, has bagged a further order for its call center business.

The order involves handling billing related calls for a large telecom client based in the US and is to be initiated with 200 Customer Service Representatives (CSRs) with immediate effect, a company release states. The capacity would be scaled up to 600 CSRs by June. HTMT is already handling in-bound marketing calls for the same customer.

HTMT‘s customer is a $ 2 billion telecom company and is an integrated communication provider of telecommunication products and services across US and Europe. Queried as to why the name of the company was not mentioned, an HTMT representative said it was because there was a confidentiality clause built into the agreement.