Mobile Connectivity

Alphabet, parent company of Google, is shutting down Loon, its subsidiary dedicated to providing broadband from balloons in the stratosphere. Loon CEO Alastair Westgarth announced the news in a Medium blog post on Jan. 22.  “Loon has been chasing the hardest problem of all in connectivity — the last billion users: The communities in areas...

Gilat Satellite Networks’ Electronically Steered Antenna (ESA) has been successfully tested over Inmarsat’s Global Xpress (GX) network, the companies announced Thursday. Gilat’s open-architecture antenna has been integrated with Inmarsat’s G-MODMAN solution.  This marked the first time a live demonstration of an ESA terminal was executed on an operational GX satellite. In the test, performed on...

SoftBank Group has made an investment into the new iteration of OneWeb, the company announced Jan. 15. This marks SoftBank re-investing into OneWeb, after the former majority investor pulled out of a funding round in March, sending the company into Chapter 11 bankruptcy.  OneWeb did not disclose the specific amount of funding for SoftBank’s new...

With so many new satellites being launched into Geostationary Orbit, Low-Earth Orbit, and Medium-Earth Orbit, (GEO/MEO/LEO), ground segment and technology providers face increasing pressure to develop systems that power new constellations. hiSky, established just under five years ago, is looking to meet the market’s demand with its new Smartellite system — a small and compact...

At the 13th European Space Conference on Wednesday, Gerry Collins, network and services policy expert for ESOA stated that the satellite industry needs to change its way of doing business in order to make the most of new 5G opportunities. “The satellite industry has a terrible habit of over-complicating things,” he said, and the discussion...

Globe Telecom awarded Gilat Satellite Networks a multi-million dollar managed service contract for cellular backhaul over satellite, as part of a significant project expansion between the two companies. The exact dollar value of the contract was not disclosed. Globe is the largest Mobile Network Operator (MNO) in the Philippines, and the company chose Gilat’s solution to...

ThinKom’s K- and Q-band phased-array antenna have been tested and proved to meet or exceed performance metrics to operate with the frequency-hopping waveform of the Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) protected communications satellite network.  The company announced Monday that it recently completed Over-the-Air (OTA) tests of a pair of K- and Q-band phased-array antennas communicating...

Intellian revealed Monday that the company is finishing production of dedicated, Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite user terminals for OneWeb. Intellian originally partnered with OneWeb in 2019 to build terminals, and the companies restarted their prior agreement after OneWeb emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Intellian’s agreement with OneWeb is for the production of a wide range...

SES has signed an agreement with Pivotel to build a new satellite ground station at the Pivotel teleport in Dubbo, New South Wales, Australia. This ground station, announced Monday, will support SES’s O3b mPOWER Non-Geostationary Orbit (NGSO) constellation, and will begin operations in the second half of 2021. This ground station project is part of...

On the heels of opening a new U.S. office and joining Telesat’s team for a U.S. defense contract, Mynaric is looking to make its laser terminals mainstream on megaconstellations and disrupt how data is transferred in space.  Mynaric, a German company, has been developing laser terminals specifically designed for volume production since the company was...