BADR-6 was launched on 7 July 2008 on an Ariane 5, to replace the lost Arabsat-4A. Arabsat-5 Arabsat let a contract on 16 June 2007 for the manufacture and launch of the fifth generation of Arabsat satellites, based on the Astrium's Eurostar E3000 platform and Thales Alenia Space payloads: The first of the fifth-generation satellites, named BADR-5 (technically: Arabsat-5B), was launched by Proton at Arabsat's 26.0° East Direct-to-Home television "Hot Spot" on 3 June 2010. The second of the fifth-generation satellites, Arabsat-5A, was launched by Ariane at the 30.5° East orbital location on 26 June 2010. The third of the fifth-generation satellites, Arabsat-5C, was launched to the new 20.0° East orbital location on 21 September 2011. Arabsat-6 Badr-7 (Arabsat-6B) was launched successfully in tandem with GSat-15 on 10 November 2015 from the Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, atop an Ariane 5 launcher. The launch of Arabsat-6A with a Falcon Heavy rocket was on 11 April 2019. Arabsat-7 Arabsat signed a contract on 29 April 2022 with Europe’s Thales Alenia Space, which will build the Arabsat 7A satellite based on its Space Inspire platform. The satellite is Arabsat's first fully software-defined geostationary satellite and will provide coverage across the Middle East, Africa and parts of Europe. It is expected to replace most of the existing C and Ku-band capacity at 30.5 East that is provided by Arabsat 5A and is approaching end-of-life. Controversies In July 2019, some of the biggest football authorities that control the Premier League, World Cup and Champions League, called on the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to stop its homegrown piracy of TV and streaming service, illicitly broadcasting matches globally via Arabsat. Saudi was strongly criticized in a letter issued by sports bodies including, FIFA, UEFA, Spain's La Liga, Germany's Bundesliga and Italy's Serie A along with the Asian Football Confederation. The letter was issued after 18 months of failed efforts at legally challenging Saudi Arabia to block beoutQ for pirate broadcasting the entire World Cup 2018. The authorities said in a joint statement, "We collectively condemn in the strongest possible terms the ongoing theft of our intellectual property by the pirate broadcaster known as beoutQ and call on the authorities in Saudi Arabia to support us in ending the widespread and flagrant breaches of our intellectual property rights". The sporting bodies have also accused nine Saudi Arabian legal firms of not taking on their copyright infringement case,