Albion, MI - Feb 26, 2002 - At the Satellite 2002 tradeshow held in Washington, DC, in March, Patriot Antenna Systems, formerly Satellite Export and Engineering, a manufacturer of satellite ground station antennas, announced that it had received Standard Intelsat Type Approval for its new 1.2 and 1.0 meter Ku-band transmit/receive antennas. Patriot is the first company to receive Standard Intelsat Type Approvals for 1.2 meter metal antennas.

The 1.2-meter antenna has achieved Standard G and K-2 Intelsat Type Approval. The K-2 classification is dependent upon an appropriate low-noise block down converter (LNB) noise figure. The Patriot 1.2 meter metal antenna is the first to receive the Standard K-2 Intelsat Type Approval. The 1.0 meter metal antenna has received a Standard G Intelsat Type Approval.

During development of these products, Patriot made it a priority to implement customer requests for features and improvements not offered by existing manufacturers. The new antenna products will feature elevation and azimuth fine tuning capability for reduction of pointing errors during installation and reinforced steel arms that can accommodate up to 14 pounds of equipment mounted on the end of the feed-boom. This is one of the highest weight ratings in the industry for antennas of these sizes. In addition to the weight capacity, an additional 25 pounds can be supported under the boom at the back frame to accommodate radio equipment. Low-cost mounting brackets have been designed to allow customers a wide range of flexibility in choosing electronics to be used with the antennas. Patriot will leverage its 300,000 square foot facility to keep a large quantity of these antennas in stock for response to short lead-time projects, a concern also raised by customers.