WORLDSPACE® Satellite Radio, one of the world leaders in satellite-based digital radio services, yesterday received authorization from the Federal Communications Commission for its satellite operating subsidiary, AfriSpace, to launch and operate the AfriStar-2 satellite. The AfriStar-2 satellite is already constructed and is currently in storage in Toulouse, France. It is intended that, at the time AfriStar-2 is launched, it will be inserted into geosynchronous orbit at 21º East Longitude. The satellite will be co-located with AfriStar-1, which has sufficient capacity to serve at least one linguistic market in Western Europe. AfriStar-2 will allow WORLDSPACE to expand its digital satellite radio services into Western Europe. It is also intended to serve as a replacement with respect to certain areas currently covered by AfriStar-1 when that satellite reaches the end of its operational life.

Since 1999, WORLDSPACE has offered fixed and portable satellite radio services in Western Europe via AfriStar-1. WORLDSPACE has priority rights throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa to use the L band frequencies allocated by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) for satellite radio. Currently, WORLDSPACE is developing a new mobile receiver for distribution to consumers in the European market. This new receiver, coupled with AfriStar-2’s additional broadcast capacity, will enable WORLDSPACE to offer a great variety of Euro-centric music, sports, news and talk radio programming to mobile and home subscribers throughout Western Europe.

Noah Samara, Chairman and CEO of WORLDSPACE, stated, “The FCC’s authorization is great news for us. It removes any uncertainty about having a license to operate AfriStar-2 and allows us to implement our European launch plan. This will give us expanded capacity to provide a focused satellite radio service to European markets in line with the company’s execution plans.�

In addition to granting this license, the Commission waived the requirement that WORLDSPACE pay a $3 million bond, because the orbital location and frequencies requested for AfriStar-2 are being used currently by AfriStar-1.

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