Euroconsult reports increased competition and a strong impact from the COVID-19 pandemic on Fixed Satellite Services (FSS) companies in its annual publication, FSS Operators: Benchmarks & Performance Review, released in November. According to Euroconsult, most publicly listed operators reporting on a quarterly basis have reported lower revenues in the Third Quarter of 2020, compared to the same time period in 2019. For the first three quarters of the year, these companies have reported revenues down 4% on average, year-over-year.

FSS operators are looking for other sources of revenue and operators are turning to vertical integration Euroconsult reports, citing the recent acquisitions of Bigblu Broadband by Eutelsat and Gogo by Intelsat. Euroconsult expects this trend to continue in the coming years. The report says that vertical integration allows operators to offer better value to end users, and blending managed services into their wholesale strategies empowers them to better manage bandwidth usage.

“Operators with exposure to the mobility market have suffered the most from the COVID-19 pandemic,” commented Dimitri Buchs, Euroconsult senior consultant who authored the report. “However, revenue declines appear to be decreasing as the year progresses, maybe a sign of what to expect in 2021.”