Speaking after receiving a model of the satellite to mark the handover from ISRO chairman K Kasturirangan, IntelSat director general C Kullman said the transponder capacity had been leased out to Russia for operating VSAT networks for the corporate sector besides private broadcasters in the country like Sun Network, Eenadu, Vijay TV, Jaya TV and Asianet.

He said IntelSat had for the first time leased transponder capacity from a service provider and was looking forward to getting more capacity from Insat. An IntelSet team would discuss with the ISRO, the future plans, that include loading additional Insat capacity during the next four to five years, he added.

Kasturirangan later told newsmen that the discussions were still in preliminary stages and ISRO wasaiming at building additional transponder capacity to the tune of 35 to 40 per cent to give to other providers apart from meeting the social and economic needs of the country.

The ISRO chairman also received a cheque for Rs 2.8 crore ($0.68 million) as the first payment from IntelSat which had agreed in January 1995 to pay $100 million over the next 10 years for leasing out the Insat-2E transponders.

IntelSat would start using the transponders in the next few weeks after conducting interface tests between the satellite and earth stations.

Kasturirangan said Insat-2E would contribute new dimensions to India's television broadcasting and meteorological capability. The constellation of Insats were at present operating the largest domestic satellite communication system with 60 transponders. The demand for the next five years had been estimated at about 130 to 135 transponders and necessary steps to augment the capacity, especially the extended C-band and Ku-band transponders were being taken up in the nextgeneration satellites, he added.

Kullman said IntelSat was keen in augmenting its transponder capacity in view of the phenomenal growth in the Asia-Pacific region. Though the demand was subdued now due to the financial crisis in the South-East Asian countries, the momentum would pick up in the coming years, he added.

Department of Telecommunications secretary Anil Kumar, who was also present, highlighted the utilisation of Insat transponders for communication purposes and spoke about the demand for extended C-band and Ku-band transponders from its customers to meet VSAT operations.

IntelSat will within the next two years become in independent corporation, Kullman said.He said with 143 countries across the globe having stake in it, IntelSat had already initiated steps towards becoming a separate corporation to keep pace with the changing technological and communication requirements.

Kullman said the communications world needed to be flexible especially to cater to newer services such as internet andDTH.

He said details for the corporatisation was being worked out and he was in contact with various countries including India.