Officials from the National Space Program Office (NSPO) said yesterday there was no truth to news reports claiming Taiwan would invite tenders this month for launching its second satellite, ROCSAT-2
"As far as I know, no contract related to ROCSAT-2 is under way," Ling Jer
It had been reported yesterday that US, German and Israeli firms had expressed an interest in ROCSAT-2.
"Several US, German and Israeli firms have expressed interest in winning the contract," Chen Chao-hsing (陳紹興), an NSPO spokesman was quoted as saying.
Ling said that the ROCSAT-2 project, under a contract with France-based Matra Marconi Space (MMS), was going very well.
"Next week, half a dozen MMS engineers will arrive in Taiwan to review the design of the payload system," Ling said, adding that more than a dozen Taiwanese engineers at NSPO will visit the MMS facility in France at the end of March. The reciprocal visit is to jointly review design with MMS engineers.
ROCSAT-2, a 900kg civilian satellite designed to explore environmental resources, is scheduled to be launched in 2003.
Taiwan awarded the contract to build ROCSAT-2 to Germany's Dornier Satellite System last January, but gave it to Matra-Marconi Space last November after the German government refused to issue an appropriate export license to Dornier.
Press reports at the time said Bonn made the decision in order not to worsen its ties with China, which had been harmed by NATO's bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade last May.
Taiwan launched its first satellite in January 1999 and plans to launch ROCSAT-3 -- a group of eight micro-satellites -- within six months to a year of ROCSAT-2's deployment. The micro-satellites will weigh about 40kg each.
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