Telesat’s headquarters in downtown Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Photo: Telesat

Canadian satellite operator Telesat maintained its full-year 2023 revenue guidance in its 2023 third fiscal quarter (Q3) results, as it hopes to keep losses at a minimum in the ramp up the launch of its long-awaited Lightspeed constellation.

In its results issued on Monday, Telesat reported consolidated revenue of $175 million (all figures in Canadian Dollars), a 3% year-over year (YoY) decrease compared to the same period last year, driven mostly by lower revenue from its South American customers.

Telesat’s operating expenses for the quarter were $50 million, a decrease of $6 million from 2022, with Q3 adjusted EBITDA falling 3% to $133 million. The company’s net loss was $3 million compared to a net loss of $229 million for the same period in the prior year.

Despite the declines, Telesat President and CEO Dan Goldberg maintained the operator’s full-year 2023 revenue guidance to fall between $690 million and $710 million, assuming a foreign exchange rate of $1 U.S. dollar to $1.35 Canadian dollar exchange rate.

“We remain on track to meet our guidance and, as a result of our continued disciplined execution, delivered industry leading Adjusted EBITDA margins, high capacity utilization, a substantial contractual backlog of $1.5 billion, and a cash balance of $1.8 billion,” said Goldberg. “In addition, in the third quarter and subsequent period we strengthened our financial position by repurchasing debt with a cumulative face value of US$195 million, received the remaining C-band proceeds from our U.S. spectrum clearing efforts, and successfully completed in-orbit testing of our LEO 3 demonstration satellite.”

Consistency is important for Telesat, which announced just this past summer that its Lightspeed constellation was fully funded after years of delays caused by financing issues. The operator also selected MDA to be the prime satellite contractor for Lightspeed and entered into a contract with SpaceX in September for 14 Falcon 9 rockets to launch the system’s satellites.