Wikipedia
The Intersputnik International Organization of Space Communications, commonly known as Intersputnik, is an international satellite communications services organization founded on November 15, 1971, in Moscow by the Soviet Union along with a group of eight formerly socialist states ( Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Mongolia, and Cuba).
The objective was and continues to be the development and common use of communications satellites. It was created as the Eastern Bloc's response to the Western Intelsat organization. As of 2008 the organization has 25 member states, among them the Federal Republic of Germany as the legal successor of the GDR.
Intersputnik nowadays is a commercially aligned organization. It operates 12 satellites in orbit and 41 transponders. In June 1997 Intersputnik created the Lockheed Martin Intersputnik (LMI) joint venture together with Lockheed Martin, which builds and operates the satellites of the same name.