LeoSat Enterprises, an emerging company with plans to launch a constellation of up to 108 low-earth-orbit communications satellites, has named industry veteran Mark Rigolle as the company’s new chief executive officer.

Advantech Wireless announced that Steve Richeson has joined the company as Senior Vice President, Global Sales and Business Development. Steve joins Advantech  from his most recent position at Harris Corporation where he was instrumental in establishing a sales pipeline for the Communications Solutions business unit of Exelis (formerly ITT Defense) prior to its US$ 4.6 billion acquisition by Harris.

Thaicom has announced the appointment of Mr. Paiboon Panuwattanawong to take up the roles of Chief Executive Officer of Thaicom and the authorized director of Thaicom effective October 1, 2015. The previous CEO, Ms. Suphajee Suthumpun, will assume the role of Advisor to the Chief Executive Officer to support the new CEO during the leadership transition period from October 1 to December 31, 2015.

WORK Microwave, a manufacturer of advanced satellite communications, today announced that it has opened a new office in Tucker, Georgia to broaden the company's market reach across the Americas. Waylon Sun has been appointed as vice president, business development and sales, at this location. 

DiViNetworks, the provider of network optimization solutions for the Internet and telecom markets, today announced that Eyal Copitt has assumed the CCO (Chief Commercial Officer) position where he is responsible for operating the global sales, business development, marketing and channel development teams. He reports to CEO Barak Avitbul. The company also expanded its sales team by appointing Guy Eran VP Channels and Global Accounts; Udi Frohman VP Sales Asia & Pacific; Sharon Ruso Director, Pre-Sales; and Vadim Arman VP Sales Russia. They join veteran Sales VPs, Daniel Najman for Latin America and Tsahie Lavi for Africa.

Imagine Communications, a global leader in video and advertising solutions serving the media and entertainment, multichannel video programming distributors and enterprise markets, today announced the promotion of Ramnik Kamo to the position of Chief Marketing Officer. In addition to overseeing Imagine Communications’ overall marketing strategy, Kamo will be responsible for business development, partnerships and merger and acquisition activities.

John Branscum, President of Comtech Xicom Technology, Inc., will succeed Robert McCollum, President of Comtech EF Data Corp., who will be retiring on July 31, 2015. Branscum, who has more than 30 years of industry experience, joined Comtech in 2008.

Satellite operator Intelsat S.A. (NYSE: I) today announced that Karen Schmidt, a veteran marketing executive with more than 25 years’ experience, has been named as the company’s Vice President of Marketing, effective immediately.

Johann-Dietrich Wörner has assumed the postion of Director-General of the European Space Agency (ESA) effective today. He is based at ESA Headquarters in Paris, France.

At CommunicAsia 2015 in Singapore, Satellite Markets and Research Editor-in-Chief Virgil Labrador spoke with Mario Querner VP, Asia-Pacific of equipment manufacturer Newtec.