Jakarta. Indonesia is set to launch the Satria-1 satellite on Monday Jakarta time in a bid to provide high-speed internet connections for better public services.

“The satellite is expected to help provide internet access to remote areas that are unreachable by fiber optic technology over the next 10 years,” acting Communications Minister Mahfud MD told a press briefing earlier this week. 

Satria-1 will focus on connecting schools, hospitals, sub-national government offices, police and military to the fast internet. The satellite, however, will only start operating by Jan. 2024 as it would take around 145 days for it to reach the orbit.

The megaproject runs on a public-private partnership that involves satellite service provider Satelit Nusantara Tiga and PSN consortium.

“We initially thought that the total capex [capital expenditures] of Satria-1, including the satellite, rocket, ground station, and so on, would reach around $450 million,” Adi Rahman Adiwoso, the executive director at Satelit Nusantara Tiga, told the same presser.

“But we had a cost overrun of $90 million, so that would bring the total investment to $540 million,” Adi said.

The Satria-1 satellite has a lifetime of 15 years. Indonesia will launch the 150-gbps satellite on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket launcher from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. French-Italian aerospace firm Thales Alenia Space constructed the satellite which Indonesia claims to be the largest in Asia from a capacity standpoint.

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