As NASA’s Perseverance rover was preparing for its successful descent and landing on Mars, another successful event was happening in Québec, the announcement that $1.8 billion would be invested into the province by Telesat, MDA and the Government of Québec for Telesat’s Lightspeed telecommunication satellite constellation.
The Government of Québec hosted the press conference and Premier François Legault seemed jubilant in discussing the deal.
“Today’s news is extraordinary, both for Québec’s aerospace sector and for Québec as a whole. The preservation of 650 jobs and the creation of a further 600 jobs at about $100,000 a year is an example of how Québec will bridge the wealth gap with neighbouring jurisdictions.”
The Memorandum of Understanding signed would see Québec invest $200 million as a loan and $200 million as a preferred equity. Québec sees the investment as a temporary one with Pierre Fitzgibbon, Minister of Economy and Innovation saying “the structure we took is that there’s two pieces of the capital structure that we have. One is a loan that will be basically a market price loan. And the other one is a return which will be commensurate to the profitability of the company, because what we want, is we want to be aligning our interests with those of the shareholders. So in this case, here, no we’ll be patient, and then when there’ll be time where a return will be there, we’ll take our share, and eventually will be taken out. The idea here is not to be permanent in the capital, but to be temporary. And I think this is a huge, multi billion dollar project. And the reason that I think Telesat was comfortable to deal with us is we’re helping them in raising money.”
Telesat will invest $1.6 billion and MDA will invest $200 million. The final agreement is expected to be completed in the coming months.
While answering a question on the impact the announcement will have on the West Island of Montreal, Premier Legault brought up the point that while the aerospace sector has been having difficulties, he sees the space sector stepping up and providing a “catalyst for growth” in the province.
For its investment Québec has guaranteed that Telesat Lightspeed operations will be based in the province and consist of a new Telesat campus in Gatineau, across the Ontario/Québec border just north of Ottawa, with a Network Operating Centre, a Satellite Control Centre, a Cybersecurity Operations Centre, an Engineering Lab and an advanced Landing Station. 320 of the new jobs will be hosted at this campus.
As well, Telesat’s prime contractor, Thales Alenia Space, is expected to work with MDA to create a new facility in Québec for the final assembly, integration and testing of the 298 satellites that make up the satellite constellation. Negotiations with Thales Alenia Space are still underway and not finalized on this aspect of the deal.
In the his opening remarks at the press conference, Telesat CEO Dan Goldberg said “To build and operate this network, Telesat will be investing $1.6 billion into Quebec over the coming years. And as Mike (Greenley) will say more about shortly, MDA, a world leading Canadian space technology company, with a significant presence in the province, will manufacture at their facility quite close to here, the highly advanced phased array antennas for the Lightspeed constellation. These revolutionary antennas enable Lightspeed to dynamically focus high capacity broadband links into rural and remote communities and other demand hotspots across Canada and around the world. This technology will give us at Telesat a real competitive advantage in the world global market. And in addition to the cutting edge antennas, the final manufacturing of the Lightspeed satellites will take place here in Quebec. These satellites are some of the most advanced satellites ever conceived. And the state of the art manufacturing facility here will build on average, one Lightspeed satellite per day, which is astounding, given that our current satellites take around three years to build.”
Along with the possibility of working with Thales Alenia Space on the final manufacturing facility, MDA will manufacture more than 1000 Direct Radiating Array (DRA) antenna which MDA describes as “a revolutionary phased array, electronically-steered multi-beam antenna that will provide unlimited coverage flexibility and agility through advanced beam-forming technology.” $50 million of the Government of Québec loan will go to MDA.
MDA CEO Mike Greenley said during the new conference “MDA will design and build the satellites advanced phased array antennas that will provide flexible coverage achieved through advanced digital technology. The antenna will be able to dynamically focus its beams to deliver multiple gigabytes per second of capacity into high demand hotspots.”
“MDA is also in advanced discussions with Thales Alenia Space for the Lightspeed satellite’s final assembly and manufacturing here in Quebec. This project will create close to 300 jobs for MDA here in Quebec over a period of the next five years, while sustaining our existing highly experienced and specialized engineering workforce.”