The Worldspace Programme: The First DAB Satellite Service for the World

The WorldSpace satellite DAB system will provide by 1998-1999 dozens of high quality radio channels accessible to a potential audience of 4 billion people world-wide who currently receive with various kinds of difficulty and limitations terrestrial radio programming. The system will consist of geostationary satellites, low cost radio receivers called StarMan™, and the associated ground control networks. The system will use state-of-the-art digital audio coding techniques and, on board the satellite, baseband processing technology. This paper presents the overall description, performance and industrial organiazation of the system.