Live coverage: GSLV Mk.2 lifts off with the GSAT 7A communications satellite

Lockheed Martin will build two communications satellites for Saudi Arabia’s Arabsat, and Arianespace and SpaceX will launch the commercial relay platforms under contracts valued at $650 million announced Wednesday.

Rocket Lab’s first launch of the year lifted off Thursday at 7:27 p.m. EDT (2327 GMT) after a four-day delay to replace a video transmitter and wait for improved weather. The company’s Electron rocket launched from Mahia Peninsula on New Zealand’s North Island with a technology demonstration satellite for DARPA, the U.S. military research and development agency.

An Ariane 5 rocket took off from French Guiana Friday with the heaviest interplanetary science probe ever launched, kicking off a $1.7 billion European Space Agency mission on a decade-long quest to Jupiter’s icy moons in search of environments that could be habitable for life.