Commercial Applications
Satellite communications have been used for maritime connectivity for years, but now are being deployed by many vendors in an effort to extend internet access and communications to rural areas. Companies like WildBlue and HughesNet provide fast and affordable high-speed internet access to areas that aren’t served by wireline carriers. For the enterprise customer, vendors such as CapRock and VSAT Systems also provide a variety of solutions to ensure mission-critical systems stay afloat when disaster strikes. Operating on a larger scale, Thuraya, which was founded and financially backed by a consortium of leading national telecommunications operators, provides cost-effective mobile satellite services in more than 140 countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, Australia and the Middle East.
Similarly, commercial airlines are employing satellite technology from vendors like AirCell to provide in-flight broadband. And VSAT Systems even offers a turnkey solution for VNOs looking to grow into the satellite communications space. (A good list of satellite internet service providers and their offerings can be seen here: http://www.satsig.net/ivsat.htm)
A look at the specifications and limitations of satellite connectivity is sobering, however. For consumer connectivity, data rates typically range from 56 Kbit/s to 4 Mbit/s, and bandwidth thresholds are dramatically lower than the ballyhooed caps imposed by Comcast or AT&T. The cheapest plan on WildBlue, for instance, costs $50 per month, offers 512 Kbit/s download speeds, and just 7.5 GB of bandwidth per month. That equates to less than four hours of HD video streamed by Netflix. Prices rapidly scale with speed and monthly throughput, and even the most expensive plans offer less than 20GB monthly usage before overage fees kick in.
Commercial offerings have significantly more headroom, but are also much more expensive. Data rates of 6.0 Mb/s are common, and some providers offer broadband speeds that meet high-speed wireline levels. In fact, the recently launched Eutelsat KA-SAT satellite promises to offer businesses up to 50Mb/s download speeds. According to Eutelsat’s press release May 31, the new satellite offers a total throughput of 70Gbps and “The combination of KA-SAT’s exceptional capacity and SurfBeam 2 will make it possible to deliver Internet connectivity at speeds comparable to ADSL for more than one million homes in Europe and large parts of the Mediterranean Basin.”
Backhaul and Large-Scale Deployment
While commercial applications are in play and servicing large customer bases, satellite backhaul and large-scale residential and commercial deployment is another story. Backhaul and multi-million subscruber customer networks require transmission of massive amounts of data, which is inherently one of the cost limitations facing satellite technology. Ryan Sher, COO, WIOCC (West Indian Ocean Cable Company) doesn’t see satellite replacing large terrestrial networks anytime soon. "The issue with satellite is the cost is so high and the bandwidth is so small, that in the African market the satellite operators are trying to figure out what to do with these systems…They’re only used where you can’t get cable."
Still, that hasn’t stopped global operators from trying.
Detecon Al Saudia launched a VSAT service at the end of May that promises to provide critical data communications backup for financial institutions, corporations, government agencies and military organizations. The satellites are geo redundant, and offer extremely fast resiliency in the event of a link outage. Detecon claims they “will be able to restore a customer link in as few as 120 seconds should it go down.” And Network Nine in Australia and New Zealand turned to satellite to provide a resilient disaster recovery service to cover potential failure of redundant long-haul fiber services.
Justin R. Philips, VP of Marketing, Microstat Systems Canada, feels that the future is bright for satellite backhaul. Philips recently wrote a white paper advocating satellite backhaul, claiming “Backhaul via satellite has become a viable solution for the explosive demand being experienced worldwide. Backhaul is more cost effective and can be less expensive to implement and will, for now, have to meet demand until newer, more cost effective solutions emerge.”
