Malaysian National Space Agency

The agency’s infrastructure includes several ground stations for communication with satellites and the main space center, where the operational center is located to track the activities of space missions, and the optical calibration center. Also, an assembly, integration and test centers are being built at the Space Center. For the implementation of future launches of their own launch vehicles and the provision of launch services to foreign partners in Malaysia, it is planned to build an equatorial cosmodrome in the sparsely populated states of Sabah or Sarawak located on the island of Borneo . ^[one]

Malaysia uses satellites , both acquired abroad and manufactured in the country by Astronautic Technology Sdn. Bhd. ( ATSB ).

The first Malaysian Tiung SAT microsatellite was developed in collaboration with ATSB and the British Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. The start of the Tiung SAT-1 took place on September 26, 2000 at the Baikonur cosmodrome on the Dnepr launch vehicle. This scientific satellite is used for mapping, meteorological measurements, recording of cosmic radiation, communications.

Also telecommunications services are provided by the MEASAT ( Malaysia East Asia Satellite ) satellite series. They are built by the American Boeing Satellite Systems , but are owned and operated by the private Malaysian company Measat Satellite Systems Sdn. Bhd . The first two satellites were launched into orbit in 1996, and the third in 2006 . MEASAT-3a launched from Baikonur on the Russian-Ukrainian Zenit-3SLB rocket on June 22, 2009 .

On July 14, 2009, the high-resolution satellite RazakSAT entered the low near-equatorial orbit. The research satellite is equipped with a camera that transmits the captured images to ground stations in Malaysia.

The Angkasawan program ( Malay. Angkasawan ) was initiated by the Malaysian government to prepare the first national cosmonaut , which was Sheikh Muzafar Shukor . He flew on October 10, 2007 aboard the Soyuz TMA-11 spacecraft and was flown to the International Space Station , where he spent 9 days. The program was implemented thanks to the achievement of a bilateral agreement ^[2] between Roscosmos and representatives of Malaysia.

In 2005, the Minister of Science and Technology of Malaysia, Jamaludin Dzhardzhis said that he was ready to submit to the government a national plan for landing a man on the Moon until 2020 . For the implementation of this space project, $ 25 million is allegedly needed, but this amount, it must be assumed, amounts to the entire budget allocated by the state for space exploration, and therefore, for the time being, the program on the moon is a program to search for candidates for cosmonauts. ^[3]

• Official site (eng.)
• History of the Malaysian Space Program (eng.)