1worldspace, known for most of its existence simply as WorldSpace, is a defunct satellite radio network that in its heyday provided service to over 170,000 subscribers in eastern, southern and northern Africa, the Middle East, and much of Asia with 96% coming from India.

[2] The two operational satellites that the company had, AfriStar and AsiaStar, are now being used by their new owner, the Yazmi USA, LLC run by WorldSpace's former CEO Noah A. Samara.

[3] The company, founded in 1990, has its headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland and additional studios were located in Washington, D.C., Bangalore, Mumbai, New Delhi, and Nairobi.

In a last-ditch but ultimately completely unsuccessful effort to avoid commercial insolvency in July 2008, WorldSpace changed its brand and corporate identity to 1worldspace.

[4] Before filing for bankruptcy in October 2008, 1worldspace employed two satellites and broadcast 62 channels – 38 of which were content provided by international, national and regional third parties and 24 1worldspace-branded stations produced by or for 1worldspace.

For a while Liberty Media (a spin-off of TCI, an American cable-television group) sought to buy the assets, but in June 2010, a company called Yazmi USA owned by former WorldSpace founder, chairman, and CEO Noah Samara purchased the remains for US$5.5M.

[8] On 18 July 2011, Forbes India reported that Timbre Media was re-launching WorldSpace Radio in association with Sa Re Ga Ma in September 2011, although it would only be streamed through mobile phones, the Internet and direct-to-home television networks.

[9] 1worldspace assembled a combination of news, sports, music, brand name content and educational programming which it delivered to its market in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East.

[11][12] 1worldspace's program directors and announcers operated from studios in Washington, D.C., Bangalore, and Nairobi, where 18 original music and lifestyle channels were created for distribution.

In addition, the company planned to implement terrestrial repeater networks in order to facilitate access to new markets in Europe and the Middle-East.

A password, valid for varying periods of time depending upon the length of the subscription purchased and paid for, is provided to a subscriber and entered into the receiver.

[13] The radio sets, or receivers, which could pick up 1worldspace signals were manufactured by South Korea's AMI, India's BPL and China's Tongshi, among other corporations.

[23] WorldSpace audio advertisements in 2006 highlighted the company's ability to provide communication and data-transmission services to remote areas of the world, particularly in a disaster-relief context.

Rahman as its brand ambassador in India where 90% of its customers are located, and unveiled an integrated marketing communication campaign across print and visual media featuring an exclusive signature tune composed by Mr.

[25] WorldSpace Foundation was a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization created in 1997 with the aim of improving literacy in Africa, and providing content through satellite to smaller community radio stations in the continent.

By bypassing the isolating effects of illiteracy and remoteness, the organization routinely delivers information to people in areas lacking electricity, telephone or Internet service.

[13] 1worldspace had planned to start providing mobile radio and data services in Italy using a combination of satellite and terrestrial broadcasts in late 2009.

[28] It had signed an agreement with Fiat, an Italian automobile manufacturer, to make radios capable of receiving the signals available to car owners.

The receivers for the new markets would have been manufactured by Delphi and would have delivered a gap-free coverage to vehicles similar to that of Sirius XM Radio vehicular mobile service.