SES CEO Adel Al-Saleh Announces Investment in Lynk Global for D2D Services

SES CEO Adel Al-Saleh kicked off SATELLITE with the announcement that the operator is working with Lynk Global on direct-to-device (D2D) service offering.

Under the strategic partnership announced Monday, SES will invest in Lynk and become a channel partner to allow government, mobile network operator (MNO) and automotive customers to access Lynk’s D2D network. This will support a range of applications including remote access, mission-critical first responder and secure government communications, offshore, and automotive connectivity.

“We are going to partner from a go-to-market perspective in how we take this service to our customers. I’m excited about government, automotive, and mobile network operators, where we can take those capabilities to them. We will leverage our strong go-to-market in these segments to provide those services to our customers,” Al-Saleh said.

SES will provide Series B funding for Lynk’s D2D constellation and collaborate in developing Lynk's network architecture. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Al-Saleh said the companies plan to move Lynk’s satellite manufacturing to Europe. Lynk currently has a manufacturing facility in Virginia.

“Given the dynamics in the world, every continent, every political entity is looking for sovereignty. We will bring that capability to Europe to make sure that we can create an opportunity to participate in European projects,” Al-Saleh said.

SES sees D2D as a “huge opportunity,” and one that will evolve with mid-term growth over multiple years, Al-Saleh said.

In addition, SES will provide services to Lynk, including a relay service for Lynk to route traffic between its Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites and SES’s Medium-Earth Orbit (MEO) satellites for real-time data delivery. SES will also provide network-as-a-service with SES’s global ground network to provide gateway access and SES’s Geostationary (GEO) satellites to provide telemetry, tracking and command and monitoring (TTC&M) services.

“We believe our network in space — specifically MEO — is a great advantage to be able to move traffic between LEO constellations to MEO to deliver real-time services,” Al-Saleh said. “We also believe that our ground infrastructure is an advantage that a lot of direct-to-device can use, instead of building their own infrastructures that require a lot of capital and takes a lot of time.”

In terms of the TTC&M services, Al-Saleh explained that SES’s satellites can provide visibility to where LEO satellites are in orbit as a value-add service.

SES plans to offer these services to other companies as well, and Lynk will be the first to use them. “We're going to be offering that, working with Lynk to be the first driver in the marketplace,” he said.

Lynk was one of the earliest entrants to the direct-to-device market, claiming the first-ever connection between a satellite in Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) to a mobile phone on Earth in 2020. The company currently provides emergency alerts and two-way SMS messaging in a number of countries through partnerships with local MNOs but has not significantly scaled its satellite constellation.

Lynk is also in the midst of a deal to go public through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), but the SPAC trust has dwindled as shareholders voted to redeem their shares. The SPAC faces a regulatory deadline of March 25 to vote to approve the merger.

The company recently named former Intelsat President Ramu Potarazu as CEO. Al-Saleh said Potarazu has been a partner in driving strategic initiatives with SES.

“This long-term strategic collaboration with SES will deeply integrate our networks to enhance our capabilities, and validates our LEO D2D network,” Potarazu commented in a news release. “With access to the right satellite infrastructure and dedicated ground infrastructure through SES, we are strengthening our ability to address government, MNO, and automotive D2D use-cases.” VS