Organizations have different strategies. Looking back at the history of the satellites industry, it’s been very heterogeneous and sits outside telecom networks in general. We really need to become homogeneous and fit more with the telecom network. Statistics have shown that telecommunications and paid TV spend every year about $1.6 trillion and satellite makes up around $16 billion, which is about 1%. Therefore, to become more relevant, our solutions should interact more seamlessly with standards.
At Intelsat, we have a $2 billion unified network made of three components, namely virtualization, standards, and smart edge terminals. The virtualization is about software-defined satellites which are very flexible. The second component is standards; Intelsat is working towards open standards. The satellite industry has been heterogeneous which makes it difficult to interface and doesn’t allow you to get scale. Being part of the telecom network gives us scale.
In this framework, we will chair the NTN segment of the 3GPP as part of the Release 17 of 5G standardization efforts, which is considered a first in the industry. Never before has a satellite operator been involved in 3G or 4G standards.
Moreover, we’re the first satellite operator to get MEF Ethernet certification which will allow our network to interface seamlessly with the Ethernet portion of the network.
The third part of the standards is: DIFI (digital IF). At the moment the radio signal- IF is analog and we need a standard around the digital IF.
As the 5G standard is adopted, new markets will evolve for satellite operators, IoT, private 5G network and cellular backhaul for densification because the wave form of 5G doesn’t go as fast as transmitting more information so it needs more cell sites and edge devices. Based on some of those opportunities, a market doesn’t really exist today for satellite; it’s just starring and in 2030, it will become an 8 billion dollar market of satellite operators. There’s a driving force for us to adopt 5G and embrace it and work with the telco operators.
How will this impact the affordability and accessibility of satellite broadband services in the future?