XTAR Coverage Map (courtesy of XTAR)

XTAR has announced the results of a key demonstration, which was designed provide a SATCOM on the move (SOTM) data link from a SOTM terminal to a hub earth station at a data rate greater than 25 Mbps. The demonstration took place in July of this year. XTAR announced the results today.

A 26 Mbps satellite link was achieved between the terminal and a fixed 3.9m ground station. A 2 Mbps data link was transmitted from the fixed ground terminal to the SOTM terminal. The required space segment for the demonstration was 38.2 MHz with bandwidth efficiency of 0.73 bits/Hz, which is considered exceptionally high performance for a terminal of this size. As heavy rain began to fall, the satellite link held strong, according to XTAR.

The goal was to show that high data rates can be achieved from small SOTM terminals without the use of High Throughput Satellites. For the demonstration XTAR partnered with Honeywell, Leidos and Newtec. XTAR used Honeywell’s Wavestorm AS-X, which is a low profile slot array antenna, suitable for either airborne or ground-based applications. The satellite used for this demonstration was the XTAR-LANT satellite located at 30 degrees West longitude. XTAR-LANT is an X-band satellite, compatible with WGS terminals, with both global and spot beams.