Focus: Telecom

By James Careless In regions as different as Africa and the United States, universities and colleges rely on satellites to deliver distance education to remotely-located students, some of them hundreds, or even thousands, of miles away. Whatever their locations, the benefits are the same. Thanks to satellite-delivered learning, students are spared the often impossibly high...

As 2003 comes to a close, many corporate executives are crunching the numbers to make not only their fourth quarter results materialize in the black, if calendar and fiscal years mirror each other, but also are setting forth bullish budgets and business plans for 2004. Nothing can be worse than realizing you did not take...

By James Careless VSAT: the acronym means Very Small Aperture Terminals. But for VSAT operators around the world, VSAT means opportunity. Consistently, it seems that someone, somewhere comes up with creative new ways to use VSATs for business ventures. Here are some of the very hottest VSAT applications from around the globe, all of which...

By Nick Mitsis When one thinks of satellite communications and the Middle East, 24-hour-a-day combat operations executed in part through the use of space-based technology materialize in one’s mind. Even though the recent political unrest plaguing this part of the world has proven to be advantageous for satellite service providers fighting their own corporate financial...

by Douglas Graham Small office/ home office (SOHO) and small-to-medium enterprise companies (SMEs) are potential growth sectors for satellite broadband. These days nearly every business is Internet-driven to at least some extent and, for all those businesses, fast and easy access is not a luxury but an absolute necessity. This applies to rural, family-owned operations...

The satellite industry is starting to feel slight tremors in the ground as the next generation of encoders is starting to make its presence known. While the encoder of tomorrow remains a bit of a mystery, everyone accepts the fact that whatever comes next must outperform MPEG-2. And there is a sense that the next...

Harrah’s Creates Customer Excitement by James Careless When it comes to attracting and keeping customers, Harrah’s Entertainment does not rely on casinos disguised as theme parks. Instead, this veteran of the U.S. gambling trade uses a combination of great service, big prizes and customer appreciation programs to keep the highrollers coming back for more. Perhaps...

by Douglas Graham In the race for acceptance, digital subscriber lines, frame relay and other wireline technologies have captured the lion’s share of corporate communications spending in the United States. Currently only four percent of that figure is claimed by satellite, although satellite has many advantages. While the Internet has revolutionized business and communications, it...

By Peter J. Brown There are subtle advances in technology that are often overlooked. As the satellite industry marches on, customers and service providers alike are able to select from a growing list of software tools and solutions that can substantially boost satellite network performance. These software tools have given both the point-to-multipoint and point-to-point...

Digitally-compressed television (DTV) and Internet traffic: together, these two forces are fundamentally reshaping the teleport business. Thankfully, these changes are for the better, as far as teleport operators are concerned. As they adapt to new technologies–becoming as expert in networking as they already are in two-way RF transmissions–the world’s teleport operators are expanding opportunities and...