Hong Kong – The recently concluded CASBAA Convention saw the region’s satellite operators present a united front against perceived disregard for ITU protocol. One operator in particular, ProtoStar, has been criticized for its July 7 launch of its ProtoStar I satellite to 98.5 degrees East, despite having missed its launch deadline of June 28. Most vocal on the subject until now has been AsiaSat, saying that the operator was using non-coordinated frequencies that risked interference with established satellite transmissions. At CASBAA, AsiaSat CEO Peter Jackson’s stance on the matter was backed by top executives from SAT-GE, Intelsat, MEASAT and Asia Broadcast Satellite. ProtoStar was not represented on the Convention’s Why Satellite? panel, although October 29 saw an ITU announcement that the satellite is now compliant thanks to an arrangement with Belarus – the notifying administration for InterSputnik. CASBAA also released a new report on, the not so new topic of, the threat to TV posed by the deployment of Broadband Wireless Access services (such as WiMax) in the C-band used for the distribution of satellite television signals in Asia. Headlining the CASBAA report, a list of six high-risk markets where cable systems, hotels and other wholesale broadcast customers are likely to experience outages over the next three years: India, the Philippines, Indonesia, Pakistan, Australia and New Zealand.