My background includes lots of experience developing satellite data terminals for remote monitoring and vehicle environments. SpaceX is also continues to successfully launch thousands of satellites for the Starlink constellation, which will revolutionize the IOT and remote data industries. Starlink’s likelihood of success increased in March as OneWeb declared bankruptcy. Now to those not familiar with the satellite data industry you might not know that bankruptcy is just a pause, OneWeb will get restructured just like Iridium did in the early 2000’s. This is a common occurrence in the satellite industry.
On that note Legado (previously LightSquared, previously Skyterra, previously MSV, previously AMSC, etc… you get the idea), has been struggling to restructure just received another $100M investment money to build 5G/IOT networks. Legado has been trying to reuse its frequencies for terrestrial networks for years as their L-Band frequencies were restricted to satellite use. Given how much they squandered so far I don’t see how this money won’t get wasted and produce nothing. So I expect to see Starlink to eliminate anything Legado plans, but OneWeb will more then like be brought to life and provide some competition to Starlink and Iridium, probably providing the equivalent of Dr. Pepper vs Pepsi and Coke.
But Nick what about Thuraya, Orbcomm, and Globalstar? Orbcomm has a new set of satellites but with their poor service quality and low speeds they’ll be reduced to niche position as will Globalstar (assuming it can even survive). Thuraya could conceivably expand to the Americas but by the time that happens Starlink will be fully operational and Iridium will have a mature network that much more capable. Other then some niche markets (such as rail) that are better suited for GEO satellites Thuraya will not be able to stop the constellation systems. Inmarsat is the only wild card in the industry and they are a big player in the marine industry and BGAN provides reasonable speeds but its too expensive to compete with either Starlink or Iridium, so I predict Inmarsat will see its market share erode and unless governments want to maintain it for other services, it will eventually disappear like the dinosaurs.
So I’ve dropped a bunch of impressions and predictions. I’ll add some updates over the coming year and see how I did.
Cheers!