French Guiana (AP) - A rocket lifted off Friday from this French department in South America carrying satellites to provide broadband Internet services to rural parts of the U.S. and television programming to people across the hemisphere.WildBlue Communications' WildBlue-1 and SES Americom's Americom-18 were shuttled into space by an Ariane 5 rocket, said Jean-Yves Le Gall, chief executive officer of Arianespace, the commercial arm of the 13-country European Space Agency.
WildBlue-1 will provide high-speed broadband to homes and businesses in parts of the United States that have no such access or limited access. WildBlue has been borrowing space on Canadian satellite Anik F2 to deliver the service to its clients.
The WildBlue-1 launch will triple the number of clients the Denver-based company can serve in the continental U.S. to up to 1 million customers, WildBlue CEO David Leonard said in a telephone interview from Denver.
WildBlue will conduct in-orbit testing and plans to offer service using the new satellite beginning April 12.
The Americom-18, or AMC-18, satellite is aimed at offering full North American coverage for TV programming, including in the Caribbean and Mexico, SES Global said in a statement.
The AMC-18, which will be operated by New Jersey-based SES Americom, will join two of the company's other satellites, expanding its bandwidth resources.
It was the fifth and final Ariane 5 rocket takeoff from the Kourou launch pad in French Guiana, a French department on the northeastern coast of South America. It was Arianespace's 174th launch since the European space consortium was created in 1980.