OneWeb has successfully added another three dozen low earth orbit satellites (LEOs) to its constellation of broadband satellites.

The satellites were launched October 23 by NewSpace India Limited and OneWeb said it had successfully acquired the signals of all 36 of them.

It is OneWeb's 14th launch and brings the total of satellites deployed to 462, which the company says represents more than 70% of its planned 648-satellite fleet, which is meant to deliver on high-speed low-latency broadband competition to wired and wireless providers.

OneWeb says it is now on track to light up that global service by 2023. 

"Today's launch is a significant milestone for OneWeb," said company executive chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal. "This new phase of our launch programme from India brings us a step closer to not only enhancing our global coverage but also delivering connectivity in India and South Asia, particularly to the communities who need it most."

Back in January, OneWeb struck a long-term deal to deliver service to India, contingent on securing the "appropriate" licenses and regulatory approvals. 

OneWeb is among a number of such LEO-based satellite broadband efforts the FCC has given its regulatory approval as a way to promote broadband price and service competition, advance IoT and 5G for all, and help close the digital divide in the U.S.

OneWeb's stated goal is to get broadband to some of the hardest-to-reach areas of the world.

In June 2017, the FCC unanimously approved OneWeb's request to deliver its service in the U.S. market, including particularly hard-to-reach and expensive-to-reach rural areas.

Pai's successor, chairperson Jessica Rosenworcel, also supports LEOs as a way to provide broadband competition.

OneWeb filed for bankruptcy in 2020, suggesting it was on the verge of getting financing when the pandemic hit. It had already invested billions of dollars in the enterprise.

It was able to get new funding from, among others, the British government, and emerged from bankruptcy late last year. It secured over $1 billion in launch insurance back in September 2021. ■

OneWeb says it has successfully launched three dozen more low-earth-orbit satellites, upping the number of in-orbit satellites to 394 for its high-speed broadband delivery service.

The satellites were riding a Russian Soyuz 2-1B rocket that lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

That 394 total to date (since 2019) represents more than 60% of OneWeb's planned 648-satellite fleet.

It is the 12th launch, and 10th in the past 12 months.

OneWeb secured over $1 billion in launch insurance back in September.

In June 2017, the FCC unanimously approved OneWeb's request to deliver its service in the U.S. market (as part of a global operation), including particularly hard-to-reach and expensive-to-reach rural areas, after FCC chairman Ajit Pai proposed approving it as a way to help close the digital divide and promote private sector investment.

His successor, Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, also supports LEOs as a way to provide broadband competition.

OneWeb filed for bankruptcy in 2020, suggesting it was on the verge of getting financing when the pandemic hit. It had already invested billions of dollars in the enterprise. 

It was able to get new funding from, among others, the British government, and emerged from bankruptcy late last year. ■

The FCC has approved a license application from The Boeing Company for the construction and deployment of a constellation of low earth orbit (LEO) satellites to deliver broadband for homes, schools businesses and government uses in the U.S. and around the world.

The FCC under predecessor Ajit Pai and now acting FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel has approved a number of such satellite delivered broadband plans--OneWeb, SpaceX--to boost broadband competition and access. “Advanced satellite broadband services have an important role to play in connecting hard-to-serve communities,” said Rosenworcel of the FCC's latest approval.

Boeing is planning to launch a non-geostationary fixed orbital satellite system using some V-band spectrum. It dismissed Boeing's request to use some other portions of the V band and the Ka band, as well as certain waivers the company sought, saying it was not convinced that spectrum could be used without interference to others and because the spectrum that is not allocated internationally for such operations.

The FCC order released Wednesday (Nov. 3) approved Boeing's plan to launch 132 LEOs to initially provide broadband internet to the U.S., Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, then eventually serve the globe with its full complement of satellites.

One fan of satellite delivered broadband is Virginia's newly elected governor, Republican Glenn Youngkin. In a pre-election interview on Fox about the billions of dollars in broadband spending in the Biden-backed infrastructure bill, he suggested that flying rather than digging was the way to go.

Youngkin said that in Bedford County, Virginia, rural broadband was a big problem, but said the idea of spending "billions of dollars of taxpayer money to dig trenches" was a two decade old answer. He said the private sector was in the process of "figuring out how to deliver low earth orbit satellite technology today," as is North Carolina, in a "much more cost-effective way."

Alaskan cable and telecom provider GCI said it has entered into a $150 million partnership with Intelsat to expand its geosynchronous satellite capacity to meet growing demand in rural areas across the state.

According to GCI, the deal provides continued access to Intelsat’s C-band and Ku-band capacity -- already part of GCI’s portfolio -- but also provides new access to Ka-band spectrum across the state. 

As part of the deal Intelsat will supply a multiple-satellite solution over an enhanced managed earth station platform and a tri-band (C, Ku, and Ka) network that will cover the entire state of Alaska.

In a press release, GCI CEO Ron Duncan said the Intelsat deal will nearly quadruple the company’s available satellite capacity and is part of a much broader rural connectivity strategy that also includes its ambitious AU-Aleutians Fiber Project. 

“Today’s announcement is another example of GCI’s continued commitment to our rural customers and our willingness to make the investment necessary to serve small, remote communities across the state,” Duncan said in the press release.

Also Read: GCI Targets 17 Rural Communities for 2021 Broadband Upgrades 

GCI is Alaska’s largest telecommunications company and has delivered satellite-based connectivity for 35 years. The company said the Intelsat deal will ensure it has sufficient capacity to meet the needs of rural customers like regional tribal health care providers, school districts, government agencies, and businesses.

“What sets GCI’s satellite service apart is that we manage the network from end to end, combining Intelsat’s satellite capacity with GCI’s satellite engineering and remote logistics know-how,” GCI SVP of corporate development Billy Wailand said in a press release.

Also Read: GCI Commits to Deploy 2 Gbps Service in Alaska in 2022 

The agreement also adds another tool in GCI’s broadband service approach, which includes a mix of fiber, microwave, GEO satellites and eventually low earth orbit (LEO) satellites. GCI has been actively engaged in talks with LEO providers including SpaceX, OneWeb, and Telesat. 

Also Read: Cable’s Last Frontier 

“We are confident that LEOs will become an important part of GCI’s toolkit over time,” Wailand said in the release. “But before we begin encouraging some of our customers to consider a move to LEO satellites, we need to be confident in their performance and ability to meet our customers’ current and future demands. Our partnership with Intelsat provides GCI and our customers with an immediate solution that addresses capacity needs today, as well as the ability to integrate future technologies like LEOs when they become ready.”

Eutelsat Communications said it has tapped Tyvak International to build a low earth orbit (LEO) satellite that’s designed to support Internet of Things-focused apps and services.

The resulting Eutelsat LEO for Objects, or ELO (not to be confused with this ELO) service, will be used to assess the performance of LEO satellites in providing narrowband connectivity.

Eutelsat said it will also work with Sigfox, which runs a global narrowband network dedicated to IoT.  Part of that work will include the analysis of spectrum used by the satellite in ISM Industrial, Scientific and Medical) frequency bands. ELO will also test connectivity in other bands.

Eutelsat said low earth orbit is well-suited for narrowband connectivity for IoT, noting that the satellite will be located on a sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of between 500 km to 600 km.

RELATED: Broadband's Space Race Heats Up

Eutelsat expects ELO to launch in 2019 and backhaul information from objects located in areas that are not served by terrestrial networks and to offer a redundancy for existing terrestrial network coverage. The plan is also for ELO to collect data twice a day from IoT objects like connected vehicles, with data downloaded to a ground station in Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, for collection and analysis.

“With the expansion of the Internet of Things, new services are being developed in a wide range of sectors including smart cities, the mining industry, agriculture and logistics,” Jean-Hubert Lenotte, Eutelsat’s chief strategy officer, said in a statement.

Dish Network is also getting a fix on narrowband IoT, announcing last month that it will spend $1 billion on the first phase of such a wireless buildout using licensed spectrum.