After the success of Meteosat 1 and 2, the immediate question of continuing the programme arose. In March 1983, an inter-governmental conference of 17 European countries decided to implement an operational programme. This involved the development, successive launch and operation of 3 satellites: Meteosat 4, 5 and 6.

Between the end of the Meteosat 2 programme and the launch of the 1st operational satellite, a short intermediary programme was put in place to avoid any interruption in the supply of weather data. Meteosat 3 was launched to this effect on August 11, 1988 aboard the first experimental model of Ariane 4.

In 1986, ESA’s member states approved the principle of forming an organization for the purpose of operating Meteosat satellites. In January 1987, Eumetsat (EUropean METeorological SATellite organisation), responsible for the Meteosat programme, was founded.

However, programme responsibility was not in fact transferred until December 1995, at the beginning of the Meteosat 7 programme, which signalled the transition to the 2nd generation of Meteosat satellites. Since the launch of Meteosat 7 in September 1997, Eumetsat has had effective responsibility for the satellite, its operation and the distribution of data.

The MSG project (Meteosat Second Generation) was approved by ESA in 1986 to guarantee the continuity and quality of the European meteorological satellite programme. ESA and Eumetsat shared responsibility, ESA for design and production of the satellites, and Eumetsat for the ground segment.

The new system comprises a series of 4 satellites, and a new ground control and processing system developed by Eumetsat. The first MSG satellite was launched on August 28, 2002 aboard the Ariane 5 launcher, the second was launched on December 22, 2005.

The MSG satellites collect a greater variety of data, and do so more rapidly than the first-generation Meteosat. As a result, MSG 1 is helping to improve short-term weather forecasts and predictions of sudden phenomena, such as violent storms or the appearance of blanket fog. In 2008, MSG-1 will be working in "rapid scan" mode, sweeping once every 5 minutes over a given zone, giving a resolution of 1 km for the high resolution channel. The payload on MSG 2 also comprises GERB 1, a sensor dedicated to monitoring Earth's radiation budget.