Regional plays for multi-orbit
It goes without saying that most of the industry’s regional satellite operators are too small to field their own large LEO or MEO constellations, yet all feel the pressure to expand beyond purely GEO-based connectivity. Increasingly the trend is partnership, and British operator Avanti’s tie up with Telesat is the latest example.
Avanti and Telesat announced Feb. 21 a memorandum of understanding whereby Avanti will sell LEO services from Telesat’s forthcoming Lightspeed constellation of 156 satellites. Once Lightspeed starts service in 2027, Avanti will be positioned to offer LEO connectivity alongside its GEO fleet, which currently consists of four satellites.
Avanti’s partnership comes a month after Malaysian GEO operator Measat initiated a partnership with Starlink to become a value-added reseller of the LEO service. And in November, Japan’s Sky Perfect JSAT joined a consortium with Amazon Kuiper to provide LEO connectivity across the country.
Regional operators have been slow to execute multi-orbit strategies in the nine years since LEO satcom became a global discussion, but now that constellations are becoming real, so has the pressure. As LEO and MEO constellations gain market access in regional operator home countries, they find themselves with less time – they can partner or compete, but they can’t be indecisive.
One large open question is whether regional operators will band together to support LEO/MEO constellations of their own. The European Commission is effectively facilitating this in Europe, where Hispasat of Spain, Eutelsat of France and SES of Luxembourg are all collaborating on the IRIS2 network. In Asia, South Korean operator KT Sat, has proposed a “LEO Alliance” of local operators that would band together to support their own constellation (KT Sat also invested in MEO/HEO startup Mangata in 2022). Regional constellations come with a heavy bureaucratic burden, but aren’t without precedent. Two of today’s largest satellite operators, Intelsat and Inmarsat (now part of Viasat) were established decades ago through international consortiums.
SOURCE: https://www.telesat.com/press/press-releases/avanti-communications-signs-stategic-collaboration-agreement-with-telesat-as-part-of-new-multi-orbit-strategy/