Satellite operator SingTel and Taiwan’s Chunghwa Telecom Company Limited (Chunghwa) ordered the ST-2 communications satellite with Mitsubishi Electric Corporation (MELCO) from Japan. SingTel and Chunghwa jointly own also the ST-1 and use this satellite in their various communications businesses. The ST-2 will succeed the ST-1 as their next communications satellite.

With this order MELCO will be the first Japanese satellite manufacturer to enter the commercial communications satellite market outside Japan, using its original Japan-made satellite bus-platform.

For the production of the ST-2, Mitsubishi Electric has proposed to use its original DS-2000 satellite busplatform, which was developed based on the ETS-8 made for NASDA.

The satellite was launched on May 20th, 2011 on an Ariane 5ECA launcher operated by launch operator Arianespace and will replace the ST-1 satellite that was taken out of service.