HRH Princess Sumaya bint El Hassan, President of the Royal Scientific Society and Chairman of Board of Trustees, inaugurated today the 11th Convergence Summit taking place in Amman at the Four Seasons Hotel. The two-day summit brings together top regional and global media and telecoms industry executives.

Satellite operator ABS is preparing for a major business expansion with the launch of ABS-2A & ABS-3A in 2014/2015 and further satellites to be added to the fleet in the following two years. ABS launched its sixth satellite, ABS-2 in February 2014, covering 80% of the world's population including the emerging markets of Africa, Asia, Europe, Middle East and Russia / CIS. 

Advantech Wireless Inc., a privately-held Canadian corporation and manufacturer of Satellite, RF Equipment and Microwave Systems, announced today that its sales for the fiscal year ended April 30, 2014 were increased by 22% over previous year results. The April 30th 2014 year end is the 4th consecutive year of profitability for the company. 

A noteworthy highlight of CommunicAsia2014, industry’s preferred information and communication technology business event in Asia that will be held at Marina Bay Sands Convention Centre from 17 – 20 June, SatComm2014 will once again unveil the largest contingent of satellite companies witnessed at any single ICT trade event in Asia.

Lockheed Martinhas entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the assets of the Astrotech Space Operations business of Astrotech Corporation for US$ 61 million. Astrotech Space Operations is a satellite launch preparation service provider, from final testing and fueling to encapsulation and day-of launch operations.

The set-top box market has generally maintained historical leadership positions based on a cable, satellite or IPTV focus.Of the top five set-top box vendors—Arris, Cisco, Technicolor, Pace and Echosta—most are heavily weighted to one sector, or, in some cases, have robust proportions serving two of the three sectors.This definition won’t meet the needs of modern operators today who are looking at extending their services over multiple networks.

Global pay TV revenues [subscription fees and on-demand movies and TV episodes] will climb to $209 billion in 2020, up from US$193 billion in 2013, according  to a new report from Digital TV Research. The Digital TV World Revenue  Forecasts report states that the fast growth years are over - as a point of  comparison revenues grew by $24 billion between 2010 and 2013. 

The EUTELSAT 3B satellite was successfully launched by a Zenit-3SL rocket operated by Sea Launch AG from the ocean-based Odyssey Launch Platform in the Pacific Ocean. Lift-off of the rocket carrying the six-tonne satellite took place on Monday 26 May at 21.10 GMT/UTC.

C-COM Satellite Systems Inc., a provider of mobile auto-deploying satellite antenna systems, and ViaSat Inc.have signed an agreement to develop a low profile, Ka-band mobile antenna system for the emerging commercial Ka-band services market. C-COM will manufacture, sell and support this new on-the-move antenna product under ViaSat license.

C-COM sells its highly acclaimed Comm-On-The Pause auto-deploy iNetVu antennas worldwide and plans to use its existing distribution channel to commercialize the new Comm-On-The-Move mobile antenna.

Gilat Satellite Networks Ltd.  today reported its results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2014. Non-GAAP operating income was US$ 0.5 million, compared to a loss of US$ 0.1 million in the fourth quarter 2013. GAAP operating loss was US$ 1.5 million compared to a loss of US$ 2.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2013