Hughes Network Systems’ European VSAT subsidiary, Milton Keynes-based HOT Telecommunications, which also markets the DirecPC service in Europe, unveiled its third satellite earth station last week. HOT managing director Mike Cook said the company’s move to become a ‘global service provider’ was proceeding apace, building on the network created for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organisation. He said the final acceptance testing of the network was completed last month. Referring to HOT’s HOTstar hub network, based on Eutelsat, he said the company had "plans to extend that coverage into China and Russia" using other satellites.

HOT, originally a joint venture between Hughes and Olivetti, was originally set up primarily to market Hughes DirecPC data over satellite service in Europe, but DirecPC as a standalone service proved less than successful. HNS president Andy Werth told Interspace that "DirecPC was a bêt e noir for a while" but claimed the integration of the service with HOT’s range of other products had transformed the situation. "We have just run out of space segment," he said. He said key clients included Volkswagen, which used the service as part of its corporate Intranet. "We see [DirecPC] coming of age now," he said, admitting that the original DirecPC concept had been "premature" and that HNS had given up on targeting the private user. It also seems that DirecPC is not being marketed as a standalone service to corporate clients, but as an add-on. "The real user is the corporate client," he said. "So DirecPC as an overlay to a lot of our existing clients is a big success…[DirecPC] will become integrated in our range of different offerings. Currently we have 200,000 VSATs up there in service. as an overlay [this] is a low cost proposition."

"The scene in Europe in the last five years has changed dramatically," said Werth. "Five years ago you could not talk about pan-European networks. PTTs were guarding their precious turf."

Werth said that, since the creation of HOT, HNS had moved from selling VSAT systems to PTTs which were wary of cannibalising other data network products to selling direct to corporate clients. Referring to HOT’s recent contract to create and maintain a network for the nuclear test ban treaty monitoring organisation, he said HOT had established itself as "the first and only global VSAT provider…with hindsight we were the only credible bidder."

Cook meanwhile said that Hughes Spaceway, the plan for a GEO constellation to deliver data and Internet access, was progressing towards its planned launch in 2002. "We believe Spaceway will have a significant time to market advantage over Teledesic," he said. He said HOT would be able to take advantage of Spaceway to offer a more complete range of products. "We are already building towards Spaceway," he said, pointing out that a hubless mesh-based system such as Spaceway would offer significant cost advantages. "It will be a step forwards in terms of costs. We get even better cost efficiency with Spaceway," he said.