Nigeria's communications-satellite programme was negotiated in 2004 between the Obasanjo administration and the China Great Wall Industry Corporation (CGWIC) under a satellite-in-orbit delivery contract worth US$311 million — at the time the largest single export contract China had signed with any sub-Saharan African nation. NigComSat-1, built on the DFH-4 bus by the China Academy of Space Technology, was launched on 13 May 2007 from Xichang on a Long March 3B rocket. It was Africa's first geostationary communications satellite owned and operated by an African country and was placed at 42.5° East to provide C-, Ku-, Ka- and L-band services to Africa, parts of the Middle East and southern Europe.
NigComSat-1 failed catastrophically on 11 November 2008, eighteen months into its planned fifteen-year mission, when its solar arrays failed to track properly and the spacecraft lost power. CGWIC and the Federal Government invoked the satellite-in-orbit delivery insurance clause; CGWIC agreed to build and launch a replacement at no additional cost to Nigeria.
NigComSat-1R was launched on 19 December 2011 from Xichang Satellite Launch Centre at 16:41 UTC aboard a Long March 3B/E. The replacement carried 28 transponders — 4 C-band, 14 Ku-band, 8 Ka-band and 2 L-band — and was placed at the same 42.5° East slot. The L-band navigation payload supports Nigeria's contribution to the NigComSat / Chinese BeiDou regional augmentation, and the Ka-band beams cover the Nigerian government's Galaxy Backbone secure network.
NigComSat-1R remains in operation. Its commercial customers include MultiChoice's DStv platform, the Nigerian Television Authority, Galaxy Backbone Ltd, and several pan-African broadband providers. The satellite's economic impact has been mixed: NigComSat Ltd has struggled to fill its commercial transponder capacity, and the 2011 replacement, while operationally successful, did not produce the projected revenue streams. NigComSat-2 and NigComSat-3, contracted to CGWIC in 2018, are scheduled for launch in 2026–27.