The W series was a family of geosynchronous satellites operated by Eutelsat which provided various coverage and bandwidth options for consumer and business services in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Some of the services provided by the W-series satellites were internet, public telephony, business networks, satellite news gathering, television and radio-programme broadcasting and distribution.

The orbital positions of the satellites ranged from 7° east to 70.5° east, serving many business users, including telecommunication companies, radio and television broadcasters, international news agencies, manufacturing industry and multimedia service providers.

The series was discontinued in 2012 when Eutelsat rebranded its satellites, with the W series, Atlantic Bird, and Eurobird brands being merged to create a single fleet.

Sirius was a constellation of communications satellites operated at 5°E in geostationary orbit (GEO) by NSAB (later SES Sirius, and now a non-autonomous part of SES, owner and operator of the Astra satellites). They carried digital satellite television to the countries of Scandinavia, Baltic states, eastern Europe and Africa, including the Viasat pay TV system, along with several pay TV packages for eastern Europe, the TopTV package for Africa, a number of Ukrainian channels and the national Latvian and Lithuanian channel service free-to-air.

Sirius 3 was stationed at 51.2° East at the end if its lifetime(0°N 51.2°E) in an inclined orbit. Sirius 3 was leased to SES immediately after its launch on October 5, 1998 for a period of 12 months (after which it was moved to its original destination of 5°E) to provide capacity at 28.2°E and to back up Astra 2A, pending the launch of Astra 2B on September 14, 2000.