[Via Satellite 04-22-2014] The May issue of Via Satellite highlights the important and ever growing role of women in the satellite industry. We chronicle some of the pivotal life moments that guided SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell, Intelsat General’s President Kay Sears, and others as they decided to pursue careers in satellite.

Additionally, we talked with industry leaders on the role of High Throughput Satellites (HTS), the tactics and strategies of U.S. defense companies and other timely topics. For a preview of this latest issue, here are the top ten quotes from Via Satellite’s May 2014 issue:

“In engineering it’s not whether you’re a man or a woman, it’s how good you are … can you design this piece of hardware and will it work? It’s a meritocracy and if you can do a good job, you’re going to succeed, you’re going to get recognized, you’re going to progress.” – Susan Miller, president and CEO, Inmarsat Government

“There are women in key leadership positions, but we are missing women in important middle management roles. That is the test bed; that is where you create new leaders. In order to populate that, you need to have more women as new employees.” – Gwynne Shotwell, President and COO, SpaceX

“Africa is just an oversupplied market for traditional capacity but still is a very good opportunity. HTS is not necessarily in the same demand in Africa as it is in Eastern Europe or the Middle East. It’s just taking a lot longer [to penetrate] and is more challenging than expected.” – Christopher Baugh, president, NSR

“Women can be tough but they can also be very compassionate. … They can be highly technical but they can also be very creative and compromising.” – Kay Sears, president, Intelsat General

“Mobility is a high value market that can lead to much broader exposure for satellite if we succeed in making satellite as easy to use and manage in a mobility environment as cellular service.” – Dave Bettinger, CTO, iDirect

“It’s almost infectious when you deal with people who love space and love satellites and the capabilities that they bring to what has always been a terrestrial environment.” – Peg Grayson, president, MTN Government

“I’m still just as passionate about developing communications technology as I was back [when I started], so I know I’ve made the right choice. The knowledge that we play a key role in global communications activities such as disaster relief, remote locations connectivity and important military operations certainly makes me feel like what I do every day is worthwhile.” – Aimee Chan, president and CEO, Norsat

“I’ve proposed that the United States partner with Japan for a protected hosted payload, where they provide the satellite and launch, and we provide the payload. They can be part of our protected satcom constellation and we can expand our resiliency in the Pacific region and improve our interoperability with Japan.” – Todd Harrison, senior fellow, Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA)

“I don’t think you really see any more challenges than you would if you were a guy. You’ve got to do your job, you’ve got to do the work, you’ve got to build the relationships, you’ve got to do all the things that are going to make you successful.” – Mary Cotton, CEO, iDirect

“In East Africa, particularly, there is a wonderful cohort of technology entrepreneurs, very often from India and Asia. They’re making noise in the market. They’re pioneering, aggressive, buying capacity early … East Africa to me feels friendly for business.” – David Williams, CEO, Avanti