Vietnam took a monumental step into space by launching its first telecommunications satellite on Friday evening from South America. Ariane 5 rocket took off at 7:17 p.m. local time from the Guianese Space Centre in Kourou, French Guiana. On the same flight, the rocket carried Vietnam’s VINASAT-1 and Star One C2, a Brazilian telecommunications satellite.

“Successfully launching the first satellite is an event of great political, technical and socioeconomic significance and will help raise the image of Vietnam in the international arena,” said Doan Hop Le, Vietnam’s Minister of Information and Communication in a televised conference after the launch. “This is a memorable milestone for Vietnam in its development and integration into the world economy.”

The $300 million satellite project is meant to respond to the needs of a developing country that introduced the Internet as late as 1997. “Demand for communication is now booming,” said deputy Information and Communications Minister Tran Duc Lai, AFP reports. “Since 1997 we started to introduce Internet. Now there is very high demand. We have around 23 percent of people who can access the Internet. By 2010 the target is to reach 40 percent.”

VINASAT-1 will be positioned 132-degrees East, approximately 36,000 km above the Indonesia – Papua New Guinea border, and is designed for a minimum of 15 years in service. Vietnam’s satellite will join those of other Asian neighbors, but will be able to cover other the needs of other countries as well: “Thailand and Singapore have already contacted us,” said VNPT vice president Lam Hoang Vinh, as quoted by AFP.

Vietnam is currently trying to diminish the differences between rural and urban areas in terms of communication, and for a country that ten years ago only has fixed telephony, a telecommunications satellite is a huge step forward. According to Vihn, many of the country’s remote areas still don’t benefit from telephony or television services.