Viasat provided consumer broad services to about 590,000 US subscribers last year; Space Exploration Technologies Corp. says it has launched about 2,500 first-generation satellites in its Starlink fleet and serves almost 500,00 subscribers worldwide. The global market could be $30 Billion by 2030, compared to $12 Billion today, according to Northern Sky Research.
Over the past couple of decades, vehicles have become smartphones on wheels, with an increasing number of electronic components, chipsets, and devices being connected to a vehicle at any given time. With the advent of electric vehicles, this trend is becoming even more apparent, with what are effectively software-defined cars coming off production lines at.
“Seamless connection depends on satellite and bandwidth availability,” said Vivek Suresh Prasad, [of] Northern Sky Research (NSR), a market research and consulting firm in Cambridge, Mass., focused on the satellite and space sectors. SpaceX’s first phase is to deploy a network of 4,200-plus satellites, a plan approved by the Federal Communications Commission and the International.
Gaining regulatory approval to access new markets is Starlink ’s biggest global challenge, said Jose Del Rosario, a Manila-based consultant at satellite industry firm Northern Sky Research. But mobile roaming will greatly increase its commercial appeal. “A few thousand aircrafts and hundreds of cruise ships can close the business case,” said Del Rosario
Satellite is a cool technology again! But there is still a lot of work to be done. By way of background, despite recent significant improvements in Satellite Backhaul fundamentals, specifically throughput, capacity prices, ground segment, and cheaper RAN (among others), the industry was struggling to change MNOs’ mindsets as satellite was still perceived as an.