On 15 January 2013, DSN Corporation announced that it had closed a contract with the Ministry of Defense to execute the "Program to Upgrade and Operate X-Band Satellite Communications Functions, etc".

[3] Based on this program, DSN Corporation will manufacture and launch two satellites plus perform the necessary upgrades to ground control stations.

[6] On an earning revision, JSAT disclosed that they had confirmed container deformation after Superbird-8 arrived to its launch site.

[7] In July 2016, it was published that a 25 May 2016 mishap during air transport had delayed the satellite launch by an estimated two years.

A dislodged tarpaulin had blocked the bleed valve on the satellite container and the spacecraft had suffer from over pressurization damage.